Pharmacy

Giant Food Inc.'s new chief executive sees cost-cutting as one of the first steps in an overall strategy to preserve and increase market share in the fiercely competitive supermarket industry.In his first interview since taking the helm of the region's dominant chain Jan. 2, Richard A. Baird said Giant, which employs 27,000, needs to bring its higher costs in line with those of its unionized rivals.The company is also poised to take advantage of economies of scale under the umbrella of Royal Ahold NV, the Dutch food retailer that acquired Giant in October.

Rite Aid Corp. said yesterday that it will consider offers to purchase all or part of PCS Health Systems Inc., its wholly owned pharmacy-benefits-management subsidiary.The Camp Hill, Pa.-based drugstore chain made the announcement yesterday after its board of directors authorized management to entertain offers for PCS."Rite Aid will evaluate an outright sale of PCS or a strategic investment in PCS," the company said in a statement.The possibility of a sale took one analyst who follows the company by surprise.

Residents of Middle River are nursing a huge headache -- a developer's plan to build a pharmacy in their community.Homeowners in the eastern Baltimore County communities of Victory Villa and Aero Acres have been battling a proposed CVS/pharmacy, featuring a drive-through pickup window, at Martin Boulevard and Compass Road where a patch of woods stands.Opponents say the business would choke local streets with added traffic and ruin the quality of life with morning noises such as trucks emptying trash bins.

Some Forest Park merchants say they feel blindsided by plans to move them out by Aug. 31 and demolish the block where their businesses have stood for decades to make room for the city's first Walgreens, a national pharmacy chain store.Ten merchants in the 3800 block of Liberty Heights Ave. were told last month by Liberty-Garrison Shopping Center Inc., the corporation formed in 1982 to buy and preserve the retail area, that they would have to vacate by the end of this month.The corporation is finalizing a deal to sell, and then tear down, a block-long, Spanish-style building that houses the merchants' stores.

Giant Food Inc. is offering voluntary buyouts to 4,200 of its store employees in Baltimore and Washington as part of the company's long-term plan to stay competitive in the region, Richard A. Baird, Giant's chief executive officer, said yesterday.Eligible employees -- those hired before Jan. 15, 1992, for food; Oct. 9, 1983, for meat; or Aug. 27, 1977, for general merchandise/pharmacy -- would get a one-time lump sum payment of $30,000 if full-time workers and $22,000 if part-timers.After a 30-day period, those employees would be eligible to apply for re-employment at Giant, the company said.

Four people were taken to area hospitals after a small acid spill at a Savage pharmacy yesterday afternoon, authorities said.The spill at Neighborcare Pharmacies at 9036 Junction Drive involved 4 to 8 ounces of a concentrated acid that, when diluted, is used as to clean wounds, said Howard County police spokesman Sgt. Morris Carroll.Three people were taken to Howard County General Hospital, and a fourth was taken to Laurel Regional Hospital, all for precautionary reasons, Carroll said.Authorities said they think all four are employees at the pharmacy.

CVS/pharmacy has completed its conversion of 40 Revco drugstores in the Baltimore region, making CVS the area's second-largest pharmacy retailer.The conversion is part of the Rhode Island retailer's national plan to convert 2,600 Revco stores to the CVS name by the end of the year. CVS bought Revco D. S. Inc. in May.Renovated stores have wider aisles, brighter lights, wall-to-wall carpeting and redesigned layouts.The purchase of the former Revcos boosted CVS from fourth place to second in the Baltimore area, behind Rite Aid Corp.

An employee of a West Baltimore pharmacy fatally shot a robber and may have wounded another last night during a robbery of the establishment, police said.Maj. Steven McMahon, commander of the Central District, said two men, one with a handgun, entered the Penn-Dol Pharmacy at Pennsylvania Avenue and Dolphin Street about 6: 30 p.m., jumped over the counter and ordered a female employee to empty the cash register and place the money in a bag that one of them was carrying.McMahon said a male employee doing paperwork in an office saw what was happening on the store's closed-circuit television system, got a large-caliber handgun, left the office and confronted the robbers.

The Federal Trade Commission has dropped its investigation into whether pharmacy chains violated antitrust rules when they refused to participate in a Maryland state employee drug benefit plan, the agency confirmed yesterday.Although the FTC does not comment directly on investigations, it released a "closing letter," dated June 17, that said, "Upon further review of this matter, it now appears that no further action is warranted by the commission at this time."Rite Aid Corp., one of the chains involved, first announced the agency's action yesterday.

A month after graduating summa cum laude from the University of Maryland and giving a commencement speech, Howard County's Beth Lowenthal is ready for her next challenge.The 21-year-old former Atholton High School student is preparing for a trip to Europe and applying to graduate school.After leaving high school a year early, Lowenthal graduated from the University of Maryland College Park with a perfect 4.0 grade point average.She earned a bachelor of arts degree in French with a business concentration and minors in pre-pharmacy, German and Spanish, graduating in 4 1/2 years while working 38 hours a week as a pharmacy technician at the Giant Food store in Hickory Ridge.

Shop around 1 According to Tod Marks, a senior editor at Consumer Reports who focuses on prescription drugs, many consumers don't realize that drug costs can vary widely from one pharmacy to another. He recommends shopping around, and he says you can save hundreds of dollars if you are willing to do some price comparisons. "Pharmacies expect it," he says of the price questions. "These days there's complete price transparency. If you want to shop around, there's no doubt you can get the information you need."

Betty Davidov, who became a well-known Roland Park figure during her nearly seven-decade career working at Tuxedo Pharmacy, died Sunday of complications from a stroke at Gilchrist Hospice Care. She was 97. Betty Tskases was born in Ukraine. With the coming of the Russian Revolution, she immigrated with her family to Baltimore in 1918, where relatives had settled. She was raised on Pulaski Street in West Baltimore, where her father established a wholesale confection and tobacco business.

After a seven-week trial, two pharmacists accused of selling almost 10 million addictive painkillers illegally over the Internet were convicted yesterday in federal court in Baltimore of that offense and several others. Steven Abiodun Sodipo, 51, of Forest Hill and Callixtus Onigbo Nwaehiri, 49, of Jarrettsville were found guilty of selling 9,936,075 units of hydrocodone online using phony prescriptions; conspiracy to launder money; engaging in transactions involving the proceeds of drug sales; and filing false tax returns.

William A. "Doc" Layden, a retired pharmacist and country club founder, died Monday of kidney and heart failure at Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care. The longtime Pikesville resident was 98. Mr. Layden was born in Baltimore and raised on Whittier Avenue near Druid Hill Park. He was a 1928 graduate of City College and earned his degree from the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy in 1933. He managed a Read Drug & Chemical Co. drugstore on Linden Avenue before establishing Layden's Pharmacy in the 2100 block of W. Baltimore St., in 1939.

Leslie S. "Doc" Feldman, a pharmacist who had owned several Howard County drugstores, died of cancer Oct. 31 at his Columbia home. He was 63. Mr. Feldman was born in McKeesport, Pa., and raised in Duquesne, Pa. He graduated in 1967 from Temple University School of Pharmacy in Philadelphia, after completing a five-year course. He moved to Maryland, where he worked for several pharmacies before opening Long Reach Village Pharmacy in Columbia in 1974. He owned and operated Feldman's Medical Center Pharmacy and Feldman's Dorsey Hall Pharmacy, both in Columbia, and Feldman's Pharmacy in Ellicott City.

The College of Notre Dame of Maryland has appointed Dr. Anne Y.F. Lin founding dean of the School of Pharmacy, which will open in 2009 and will be the first one established on the campus of a women's college in the U.S. Lin was previously dean of pharmacy at Midwestern University in Glendale, Ariz. Six Johns Hopkins University researchers have been elected to the National Academy of Sciences Institute of Medicine. The new members are among 65 elected nationwide and include Dr. Ron Brookmeyer, Dr. Frederick M. Burkle Jr., Dr. Aravinda Chakravarti, Dr. Kay Dickersin, Dr. Andrew Feinberg and Dr. Lynn R. Goldman.

Elmer Klavens, a pharmacist in Baltimore from 1931 until his retirement in May at the age of 95, died of heart failure Friday at his home in the Ranchleigh neighborhood of Baltimore County. He was able to keep working three decades beyond the normal retirement age because he loved what he did and enjoyed helping people, said a son, Stuart Klavens Clay of Pikesville. Mr. Klavens died about five months after he filled his last prescription at the Chestnut Pharmacy in Hampden. "I encouraged him to keep working because it kept his energy level up," Mr. Clay said.

Two Maryland men have been indicted in federal court for illegally selling prescription drugs over the Internet and several other charges related to dispensing 10 million painkillers from their Baltimore pharmacy over two years - leading to overdose deaths of two customers, according to federal prosecutors. Pharmacists Steven Abiodun Sodipo, 51, of Forest Hill and Callixtus Onigbo Nwaehiri, 48, of Jarrettsville were indicted Friday on charges of illegally selling 9,936,075 pills of hydrocodone over the Internet, engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise and in monetary transactions using illegal proceeds, and tax charges, according to Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein's office.

Starting next week, The Sun's weekly health coverage will move to a redesigned Health Today feature section that will run every Thursday. Health Today will include the latest medical news, an increased focus on fitness, a weekly advice column with local health professionals, and regular features that include People's Pharmacy and our health events calendar.

Baltimore man, 21, dies of stab wounds A 21-year-old man who was found stabbed in a Northeast Baltimore apartment Monday died the next day, and police are investigating his death as a homicide. Dante Watson, 21, was found at 11:45 a.m. at his apartment in the 2200 block of Fleetwood Ave. in the Harford-Echodale Perring Parkway neighborhood, police said. Officers called to the apartment found Watson in the living room. He had been stabbed in the neck, and he died of his wounds Tuesday evening at Johns Hopkins Hospital, police said.