Amazon is launching prescription pickup kiosks at One Medical locations across Los Angeles, starting December 2025. Patients can now pick up prescriptions immediately after their medical appointments using a simple QR code system. The kiosks are stocked with medications tailored to each location's prescribing patterns, and pharmacist consultations are available via video or phone. Chris and Anne debate whether this is a true convenience play or a Trojan horse for Amazon's healthcare ambitions, discussing the friction points and the future of prescription fulfillment.

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Amazon's new in Office prescription kiosks allow patients to pick up their prescriptions immediately after their medical appointment.

According to an Amazon press release.

Powered by Amazon's logistics and technology, each kiosk is stocked with a curated inventory of medications tailored to the prescribing patterns of the specific office location.

The process is very simple.

You create an Amazon pharmacy account@pharmacy.Amazon.com you then schedule an appointment at any participating 1 medical location and ask your provider to send your prescription to Amazon Pharmacy at checkout.

In the Amazon app, you can select the kiosk pickup and pay with your preferred method.

You'll get a QR code to scan at the kiosk to pick up your medication.

An Amazon pharmacist will review your medication and it will be ready for pickup within minutes.

Through the Amazon app, patients can see upfront costs including available discount and estimated insurance co pays.

They can pay for their prescriptions and if needed, connect directly to an Amazon Pharmacy licensed pharmacist via secure video or phone consultation.

Chris this is also the A and M Put yout on the Spot question right away with the first headline.

Okay, all right, I'm ready.

Ad Bring it, bring it.

A and M. I'm ready for it today.

I'm ready.

Let's do it.

All right, so A and M wants to know removing any element of friction in script fulfillment will likely be applauded by customers.

But how big of a Trojan horse horse is this for Amazon Pharmacy as a means to a bigger end?

Oh man.

If it's a Trojan horse, it's a, it's, it's a, it's a Trojan horse with one of the Trojans like hanging out the, the bottom of the belly with all for all to see.

You know, that's one thing I'd say and, but I don't know, I'm not really seeing the overall play here and I have questions about how much friction is actually being removed by Amazon doing this which I'm curious to get your take too.

But you know, if you ask me am I buyer buying or selling this idea, I think I'm like 70, 30 on the sell side.

Like I get that it's an experiment and that's why I'm kind of on the third 30 side on the buy side.

But you know, when I step back, I don't think it's a well designed experiment for a number of reasons.

Like, because from an experimentation standpoint, for it to work, a number of things have to be true.

It sounds like you need to be a one medical user, so you have to get over that hurdle.

And then if you are, you have to also want to change your habits and do this, which is another hurdle to get over.

So you're really kind of testing two things there.

So in that sense, I can see it being a controlled test within the one Medical environment.

But my fear is then you don't have much confidence to take the idea out of that environment into the natural state of how people generally get health care.

And then the other point I just make in closing would be like, what do I do if the prescription's out of stock?

Like, you know, that's just super frustrating.

And so it seems like the whole thing just adds a lot of more friction points for me and especially just given how I'm used to doing this.

Like, and especially when immediate delivery is available too.

So like, I just, I just don't get what the end game here is.

Yeah, I mean, I think, I think it makes sense as a concept for one Medical.

Like, I mean this, if you're one Medical, you're probably bought into Amazon Healthcare.

You're buying into the market.

This should be part of your experience, especially since you're a newer clinic.

The article talked about the importance of making sure that people actually fulfill their prescriptions because something like almost half of people don't fulfill their prescriptions after they leave the doctor's office, which is just baffling to me.

But, but anyway, I think you have to have a method for them to pick up the prescription quickly and easily after leaving this appointment to make this worth someone.

1 Scheduling an appointment via the app, then getting their prescription filled via the app.

I think it makes sense as a cohesive way to launch and scale one Medical.

But I think this is highly dependent then on how quickly one Medical can scale and get to the like really the growth that, you know, CVS or Walgreens and their minute clinics have, or even just your local, your local provider for urgent care.

So I think that's, to me, that's the biggest thing that is, is kind of beholden to any success with this is that you have to see how quickly one Medical can scale.

I don't think it's a Trojan horse at all.

I think it's just a very simple, like, here's the convenience you can get this prescription from your kiosk, you probably can have it delivered same day within a few hours via Amazon as well if they don't have it at the kiosk at that time.

But for me, it's really, this is just about scale scaling and it's a fancy way to do that.

There's nothing new about having a pharmacy outside of the the minute clinic, you know?

Yeah, right.

Well, the interesting point you bring up too is it does start pushing the envelope on automated prescription retrieval for customers.

So maybe, you know, the CVS is in Walgreens, start to look at that and make that a little less friction filled, because that is a friction filled experience.

When you get to Walgreens, you're not feeling well and there's a line of like 10 people in front of you and somebody's arguing about their insurance and you just want to go home.

If it leads down that road, hopefully we see something here.

I don't know, it's just kind of one of those stories where.

Yeah, I'm just not sure what to make of this one yet.