Cooperative Christian Ministries and Clinic is seeking a new Pharmacist in Charge as its current PIC is looking to retire.
Peggy Bebon has been with CCMC "for many years," Sallie Culbreth, the charitable organization's executive director, said.
"She's let us know it's just probably time to step back. ... She's actually trying to retire. She let me know about a month ago that she just felt like it was time for her to retire," Culbreth said.
With Bebon's expected departure, CCMC has "a fairly immediate situation" to find a new pharmacist to continue to offer pharmacy services for its estimated 150 patients.
"We need to find a licensed pharmacist that can work every Wednesday from about 9 (a.m.) to 1:30 (p.m.) and every second and fourth Thursday from the same time," Culbreth said.
"It's a very part-time job, pays $35 an hour. We have an in-house pharmacy, so our patients can literally see the doctor here and then have their prescription filled here, our charitable patients. So it's a very important piece of the services and the health care that we offer our patients," she said.
In order to continue offering pharmacy services, CCMC has to have a staff member who can be the dedicated Pharmacist in Charge.
"The reason that we're so urgent with this pharmacy position is because to have a pharmacy, we need to have someone who's designated as the Pharmacist in Charge," Culbreth said. "It's actually a title. And that person will be on staff. Albeit it's a very part-time job, it's still what we have to have in order to have a pharmacy."
The new pharmacist will also have a recently remodeled facility after the first of the year, she said.
"I think the flow's actually going to work better," she said, noting the facility is being moved from a different wing to help consolidate and use its space better.
"We do have a volunteer pharmacist that comes in on the second and fourth Thursdays, and he has a quite a history, quite a professional history. And he used to design pharmacies, so he helped us kind of walk through how it would flow," she said.
Harrison Construction Company contractors have started work on it, she said. "So that's in place, and we have an annual inventory with the pharmacy, which we will do like the last week in December, and then the first week of January, once the inventory is done, then we'll move everything over to the new space and be ready to go the first clinic in 2024."
Work on the new pharmacy started Monday, Culbreth said.
"We just got started because the way our holiday schedule goes -- because we have volunteer doctors and nurses -- the clinic is closed the week of Thanksgiving and the week of Christmas and New Year," she said.
"They're working, the construction people are working on days that we don't have clinic. We'll have another clinic (today). So we can already get the room prepared, so that when it's time to move everything over, the room is ready to go. So it's just kind of a Jenga game right now, but the schedule is going to work really well. And it couldn't happen at a better time of year by design, so we really don't have a disruption in the services we offer our patients."
Jim Carpenter, a part-time pharmacist for Cooperative Christian Ministries and Clinic, pauses while helping prepare for the remodel. (Submitted photo)