Our Experts

B. Douglas Hoey, R.Ph, MBA

Hoey is the Chief Executive Officer of the National Community Pharmacists Association. He has spent 20+ years working in and representing community pharmacies.

NCPA represents the 23,000 community pharmacies and their pharmacists.

In 2005, Hoey was named COO and helped lead the NCPA team that scored legislative victories requiring prompt pay of Part D claims, winning a court injunction to delay AMP that saved community pharmacies over $2 billion dollars, and NCPA membership has increased by 20 percent over the past two years. He is a licensed pharmacist in Oklahoma, Virginia, and Texas and practiced for 5 years in community and Long Term Care settings contributing to the development of expansions into durable medical equipment and home infusion. For five years, Hoey also developed and taught pharmacology courses at George Washington University and Marymount universities.

He is also a member of the Board of Directors for SureScripts, Mirixa, Pharmacy e-Health Information Technology, the Pharmacy Compounding Accreditation Board, and the Community Pharmacy Financial.

He is a graduate of the University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy and the Oklahoma City University business graduate school.

John M. Coster, Ph.D., R.Ph.

Senior Vice President of Government Affairs and Director of the Center for Community Pharmacy Advocacy, National Community Pharmacists Association.

Prior, from 2007 to 2009 he served as Vice President, Federal Affairs and Public Policy, Rite Aid Corporation, the nation's third largest drug chain with 5,100 pharmacies in 37 states and the District of Columbia. He was responsible for maintaining and developing relationships with policymakers, members of Congress, and regulatory agencies and identifying and impacting Federal health program legislation and trends that impacted Rite Aid's business objectives and operations. He was also responsible for developing and executing policy and strategy relating to Federal and state health care issues.

From January 2000 until July 2007 he served as Vice President, Policy & Programs, with the National Association of Chain Drug Stores (NACDS) in Alexandria, VA. At NACDS he was responsible for policy issues relating to Federal health care programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid, and Federal regulatory issues, such as FDA and CMS.

From April 1990 through April 1994, he served as a professional staff member of the United States Senate Special Committee on Aging. In his capacity, he was responsible for all issues relating to pharmaceutical coverage and cost containment. He was involved in the drafting of the Medicaid pharmaceutical rebate provisions of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (OBRA) of 1990, the Veterans Health Care Act of 1992, and the Medicaid pharmaceutical and vaccine-related provision of OBRA 93. He served as a member of the President's Task Force on Health Care Reform, and helped to draft the pharmaceutical-related provisions of the President's Health Security Act, including the Medicare outpatient prescription drug benefit.

Prior to joining the staff of the Senate Aging Committee, he was a Health Analyst at the United States Congress Office of Technology Assessment (1989-90), a Policy Fellow at the Center Drugs and Public Policy at the University of Maryland Graduate School in Baltimore (1988-89), and a staff member of the American Society of Hospital Pharmacists, ASHP (1984-1987).

His education includes a B.S. in Pharmacy from St. John's University College of Pharmacy and Allied Health Professions in New York (1984), and a Masters (1988) and Ph.D. (1989) in Health Policy from the University of Maryland Graduate School in Baltimore. He completed an executive residency in association management at ASHP (1985). He holds pharmacist licenses in New York and Maryland.

Zachary French

NCPA's Vice President, PBM Transparency Initiatives. Previous to joining NCPA, Zack served for 3 years as Senior Vice President, Sales and Client Services, Walgreens Health Initiatives, a PBM with 9.6 million lives. Zack has also held sales and account management leadership positions in information technology companies – Apple, Toshiba, EDS- as well as consulting firms with an emphasis on healthcare and insurance markets.

Lonny Wilson DPh, NCPA President

Lonny Wilson, a veteran Oklahoma pharmacy owner and executive, took the reins for 2011-12 from Robert J. Greenwood, RPh, Oct. 12, 2011.

Wilson is one of the original founders of Pharmacist Providers of Oklahoma (PPOk), a buying group, switching service, and administrator of managed care drug plans. He has been its CEO since 1989 and owns three pharmacies in the Oklahoma City area. He also is chairman of the board of directors of the medication therapy management company Mirixa, established by NCPA.

One of Wilson's main concerns both at PPOk and NCPA has been the general price erosion in the community pharmacy marketplace and the especially deleterious effect of differing generic drug maximum allowable cost rates on third party contracting.

Mark Riley, PD

NCPA chairman Mark Riley, is the executive vice president of the Arkansas Pharmacists Association and an authority on pharmacy benefit managers. Riley owns East End Pharmacy in Little Rock, where he was pharmacist-in-charge for 20 years. He earned his bachelor of science in pharmacy and his doctor of pharmacy from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences College of Pharmacy. A one-time pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) executive, Riley has been asked by over 160 businesses to advise them on pharmacy benefit management