How to avoid postal delays and pharmacy lines with Alto

Concerned about Mail Delays tying up your Prescriptions? There’s a Better Way.

With the pandemic pushing many to avoid lines at the pharmacy, more Americans than ever are receiving their prescriptions through the mail. Last year, over 170 million prescriptions were filled by mail in the United States. According to a recent report, that number has increased by 20% since the onset of COVID-19. 

Recently, sweeping policy changes within the United States Postal Service have led to significant delays, with everything from Amazon packages to mail-order prescriptions becoming increasingly bogged down. Now, two U.S. Senators are voicing serious concerns, saying the delays are putting the health of millions of Americans at risk. 

Switch to a better pharmacy and enjoy free same-day delivery

In a recent investigation of five major pharmacies offering mail-order service, Senators Robert Casey (D-PA) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) found an increase in average delivery times ranging from 18-32%. That means millions of people with chronic conditions like diabetes, heart disease, and asthma are facing a dangerous dilemma. They can either risk unnecessary exposure to COVID-19 knowing they are especially vulnerable to the virus or possibly go without life-saving medications for days due to delays in the mail. 

Alarmed by the striking slow down, Jacqueline W. Fincher, MD, President of the American College of Physicians, released a statement cautioning that “a delay in receiving a necessary prescription could be life-threatening. My patients who rely on their insulin, or their inhalers, or any other type of medication can’t wait weeks to see whether or not their prescription will be delivered.”

This situation is certainly troubling, however, at Alto, we promise to deliver a better experience. Here’s why our courier service is the best method for ensuring your prescriptions arrive safely and on time.

Same-day, contactless delivery: We skip the mail, preferring to hand-deliver your medications that very day. We also provide contactless drop-offs to ensure everyone stays safe.

Zero risk of in-transit delays: Your prescriptions will never change hands during the delivery process, increasing not only speed, but safety as well

Convenient scheduling: Select from multiple 3-hour delivery windows that work best with your schedule

Real-time tracking: Stay updated throughout the delivery process via text or follow along in real-time in the Alto app.

Always free - There are never any hidden fees—your delivery is completely free. 

We’re committed to helping you lead a healthier life by providing swift and safe access to the medicine you need. Making the switch to Alto is easy. We’ll handle the transfer.

Concerned about Mail Delays Tying up Your Prescriptions? There’s a Better Way.

For an inside perspective on sales at Alto, we sat down with Craig Thompson, our Vice President of Sales, to learn about his experience at Alto and his advice for qualified sales professionals looking to join the team.

An Inside Look at a Sales Career with Alto

Why Our Sales Team is Central to Our Mission at Alto

Like so many big ideas, Alto began with a question: what if we reimagined the pharmacy experience to make people happier and healthier? Improvements were begging to be made: not only were most people and providers frustrated and dissatisfied with the status quo,  but medication non-adherence—when people don’t take the medication they’re prescribed—has hovered at 50%. In addition to $300 billion in avoidable medical costs, non-adherence is estimated to cause approximately 125,000 preventable deaths per year in the United States. 

With these problematic statistics in mind, Alto set out to do more than just dispense and deliver medications. Our mission is to fulfill medicine’s true purpose: to improve the quality of life for everyone who needs it. We aim to make our better pharmacy experience available to 100 million people by 2025 and we’ve raised over $350 million—including more than $250 million at the beginning of the year—in pursuit of this goal. 

To reach more people and expand into new markets, we are building a strong, mission-driven sales team to help forge the way. For an inside perspective on sales at Alto, we sat down with Craig Thompson, our Vice President of Sales, to learn about his experience at Alto and his advice for qualified sales professionals looking to join the team.

Can you tell us about your own career path and why you joined Alto?

Prior to joining Alto, I spent about 20 years in the medical device space. Early on, I worked for a few different companies before landing at Abbott Vascular where I started as a sales representative, led trainings across the U.S. as the Director of Medical Education, then pivoted back to become VP of Sales. I always envisioned that my next role would be a bigger version of that position; one where I could swing big and settle in for the long haul. 

What intrigued me about Alto was the size of the market. We spend more than $330 billion on prescription drugs a year in the U.S., but it didn’t seem like anyone was nailing the pharmacy experience, especially from the patient’s perspective. When I met Matt, Alto’s CEO, I was impressed by his patient-centered mission and his humble approach. The opportunity to build something from the ground up really appealed to me. I also loved the idea of working alongside a team of high caliber people with diverse professional backgrounds.

Alto represents a true convergence of healthcare and technology. Moving from medical devices or pharmaceuticals and coming here, you learn new ways to communicate and have access to new technology and resources.  We have our eyes on the future and a vision for how we want to scale. By keeping a strong focus, we’ve more than doubled our revenue each year for the past few years. As we continue to expand into major markets across the U.S., we’re looking to bring in highly talented people with existing relationships to build out our sales team. 

While we've delivered fantastic growth over the last few years, we're still in a phase of evolution where a new member of the team can have a meaningful impact on our organization. This is an ideal opportunity to take part in building something new and to know that as you help build a better business, you’re also helping to improve people’s and healthcare professionals’ lives. Not only have we leveled up the patient experience with our app, but we’re also making the pharmacy experience easier for healthcare professionals. Alto is uniquely suited for those who care about benefiting the stakeholders we work with. It’s genuinely all about the mission.

What makes a successful partnership manager at Alto? 

We’re looking for builders—creative people who can operate in ambiguity and thrive in a startup environment. Working at Alto is an opportunity to build new territories and make a real difference for people. It’s for those who want to create novel solutions rather than work with rails around them. We need innovative people with existing relationships who are motivated by Alto’s mission to improve lives. 

What exciting challenges await a potential team member? 

We're really at the tip of the iceberg as far as the products that we are bringing forward. There's a ton of work to be done as we consider how we can continue to meet the needs of both people and health care professionals. We’re always working to develop services and technology that can help impact adherence rates, improve the overall quality of life for people, and make physicians' lives easier by reducing the burden that exists on their teams from insurance companies. 

There will be a ton of opportunities for people to come in, demonstrate success, and find fulfilling professional paths. One of my visions for the coming year is to develop additional resources dedicated to professional and personal growth and implement programs with specific learning tracks. 

We work cross-functionally and are always open to learning new ways of operating and finding success. If you’re excited by the opportunity to create something new rather than inherit an existing territory, we’d love to hear from you. 

This is an exciting time to join the team at Alto. As we continue to forge new territory, expand into new markets, and develop our specialty areas, we’re already on track to achieve $1 billion in annual recurring revenue by 2021. To maintain this trajectory, we’re looking to grow our team with highly skilled individuals who align with our values and are motivated to create change. There is abundant opportunity to not only achieve success but find fulfillment by working toward a mission that positively impacts people’s lives.  

If you've found yourself considering embarking on a new adventure, we’d be thrilled to have you consider Alto as your next career milestone. Visit our careers page to see if we're actively hiring in your city. If you're not quite ready to make a move, join our talent community and follow us on LinkedIn to stay apprised of upcoming opportunities. 

We are building a pharmacy where every patient matters and is included. To do that, we need to foster a culture and company that is committed to challenging existing racism, injustice and prejudice, in order to create a culture and service that is inclusive. 

Diversity At Alto: Building an Inclusive Healthcare Company and Culture

At Alto, we are redefining the pharmacy experience which has been part of a very old, broken way that has fueled systemic racism. We are building a pharmacy where every patient matters and is included. To do that, we need to foster a culture and company that is committed to challenging existing racism, injustice and prejudice, in order to create a culture and service that is inclusive.  Our team consists of committed and passionate individuals who champion to effect positive change on issues related to race, injustice and prejudice.

This passion for equality is what we strived for when we first set out to build a team with a broad representation of diversity. Our goal was to create a community that reflects an inclusive culture regardless of age, education, gender, race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, socio-economic status, or other dimensions of diversity. Yet even with the best of intentions we recognize that there is more work to be done to dismantle the systems and structures that fuel racism and inequity.

2020 has been a year like none other for so many.  HR professionals around the globe have stepped center stage to support our organizations, teams and communities in ways many of us could not imagine.  I wanted to write this post to share my personal journey on this topic while supporting others in capturing this moment.  I am a white gay cis man.  Many of my identities provide much privilege.  I am committed to educating myself. I am building an environment where our teams can push past their fears to learn and grow.

Read more about Why We Prioritize Diversity at Alto.  

In 2019 we initiated our focused DEI (Diversity Equity Inclusion) work with the goal of ensuring employees felt safe, and included, and ensuring that candidates and employees have equal access to opportunity for advancement in the organization. We learned a few things during the early days of this work including balancing listening while creating the right structure to move to action.  Fast forward to early 2020, in the midst of the global COVID-19 pandemic and the murder of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, George Floyd, and Jacob Blake, we like many other organizations did not want another moment for action to pass by.

Read more about Alto’s Mission and Values. 

The week after George Floyd’s murder we hosted a series of listening sessions for Altoids.  We began them with a simple statement:  “We are holding this space for you.  Tell us how you are feeling.  Share your experiences.” The results were powerful moments of revelation, pain and heartbreak.  Black, Asian, Native and Latinx Altoids shared experiences of racism, sexism, and prejudice in their lives.  As a leadership team, we started to wake up to the enormity and urgency of the work we had ahead of us.

In reflecting on these tragic murders and Altoid voices, we realized we needed to expand the building blocks of our 2020/2021 DEI strategy. We recognized that we didn’t want to rely on the members of our underrepresented communities to lead us on this journey.  We do not expect underrepresented professionals to teach us, especially cis white men, about the history and experiences that led us to this moment. 

We made the decision to find a partner to help.  What struck me about Pathfinder and Trier Bryant, is their ability to push our thinking on this critical work while meeting us where we are (each one of us). Trier is a strategic leader with distinctive Tech, Wall Street, and military experience spanning across 15 years. Pathfinder has an unwavering commitment to advise leaders on how to create a more equitable, inclusive, and thriving culture to produce prosperous companies. I appreciate many aspects of Trier’s support including that she too is a Chief People Officer, she wears these shoes.  Given that experience plus Pathfinder’s work with clients like Equinox, Compass, SoundCloud, Gusto, and eBay, we gain perspective and lessons learned.

Our first half-day session with Trier focused on educating the group about the language of diversity (e.g. Is it okay to say Black? What makes up the LGBTQIA+ community?).  Next we spent time learning about key historical events starting from 1619 that have shaped our current society with respect to race, oppression, and white supremacy in America.  We watched videos displaying more covert forms of white supremacy [see Ellen Tuzzelo’s Pyramid of White Supremacy]. 

These are actions I could recognize in myself (i.e. not challenging racist jokes when told by my family members, not always believing the stories of Black victims).  I felt sadness and shame. Sharing these feelings and our part in the current state of our nation is an important step. We took time to process and walked away with an epiphany.  

Over the past decades, America and specifically Corporate America lulled itself into thinking that we’ve been fighting bias.  Our aim up until this moment was to reduce or eliminate bias.  We were wrong.   Our fight, our work is to eliminate racism and white supremacy in America. This work is neither a marathon nor a sprint; we’re committed to doing this work all our lives.   

With that realization in mind we got more specific about what diversity meant to us and where we wanted to focus our teams at Alto. Diversity by nature is very broad and inclusive. We used individual characteristics, experiences, and abilities consistent with our values and mission that includes but is not limited to:

*Sexual Orientation and language abilities will begin to be captured with Workday, our new HR system.

As a part of the above education, we learned that while we all have various identities and intersections that represent our Altoids, intersectionality is a term that must be clearly understood to comprehend unique modes of discrimination and privilege that occur in the workplace.  

Identity - the fact of being who or what a person is; affinity (i.e. Hispanic/Latinx, Black, Male, Female, Nonbinary) 

Intersections - a point at which two or more identities  intersect (i.e. Hispanic/Latinx Gay Male, Black Heterosexual Female)

Intersectionality -  the cumulative way in which the effects of multiple forms of self-identifications intersect, overlap, or combine to create unique modes of discrimination and privilege; intersectionality identifies advantages and disadvantages that are felt by people due to a combination of factors

While Alto recognizes a broad and inclusive definition for diversity of various identities, there are strategic priorities for underrepresented groups at the company. After benchmarking current tech and health care demographics, we decided to focus our DEI work for Altoids including our leadership, managers and independent contractors on the following underrepresented groups at Alto: 

Women in STEM (Science Technology Engineering Math)

The following month we read So You Want to Talk about Race by Ijeoma Oluo. What an incredible read! This engaged us in thinking about and naming our privilege.  In the next half-day session with Trier, we discussed the book to name our privilege and explored how it influenced our personal and professional development.  

We learned several lessons from Ijeoma and Trier including that we’re going to make mistakes and say the wrong thing; that is part of the journey yet we still must do the work.  Also that microaggressions are as damaging as overt racism and we must do better at calling these detrimental behaviors out everyday. 

Lastly, non-white people fear retaliation most when the topic of racism and prejudice comes up; we must create a space for everyone’s voices and perspectives to not only be heard but respected.

As I reflected on our second half-day session together, I saw the journey for our leadership team through four stages.

Stage 1: Self-Awareness-doing the personal work regarding racism and privilege

Stage 2: Awakening-acknowledgement of role of racism, privilege, and gressions,; doing the work in our professional life

Stage 3: Empowering-identifying the work to be done with our team, team members and building more inclusion on our teams

Stage 4: Advocating-taking our roles as a senior leaders at Alto to change behaviors and lead change at the company and our communities 

For the last round of workshops we split up our senior leaders into smaller groups so that we could focus on the work needed to be done with each of their teams.  In these sessions, we learned more about identities.  How do we identify?  What do we learn and acknowledge about our team members identities?  We discussed specific examples of how intersectionality shows up in the workplace and the role it places in each other’s experiences.  This pivot allowed us to move into Stage 3.

As we embarked on taking this work to our team, we felt more prepared and comfortable because of the time spent educating, processing and doing our own work ahead of time. This allowed each of us to live one of our core values “start with empathy.” Being empathetic is hard when you haven’t done your own work.

As a result of all the foundational work we’d done as individuals, as a team and as a company, in July, our leadership team committed to a bolder, crisper DEI plan that includes four strategies with clear goals:

Hire - ensure we have diverse teams and insure all are valued

Include - increase inclusion and community 

Develop - educate our leadership team and all Altoids

Invest - support initiatives with money and time  

This new DEI plan rallied the team and catalyzed us to make some significant changes with clear alignment, commitment and clarity around the problem we’re trying to solve. For example, one immediate change we made was to focus our executive search process on underrepresented talent. I’m excited to share that only a few months later (most searches take 6 months), we were able to hire several outstanding candidates from underrepresented backgrounds. 

Before, we had just been “hoping” for diversity and thus looking in all the wrong places.  Once hiring diverse talent  at the executive level became a critical mandate, that forced us to really seek the right kind of strategy. I’m excited to share some more of the significant changes we’ve made, over a series of posts over the next few months.

We are far from perfect.  We have work to do to meet our goals.  These are our first steps.

In January, we will share our first DEI Report including workforce demographics, success stories, lessons learned from 2020, and aspirational goals for 2021 and beyond.

We condemn the violence and systemic racism that has harmed marginalized communities, specifically Black communities, for far too long. At the same time, we commit to look inward and educate ourselves to continue to create safe spaces for Altoids and to act on what we learn. 

This will be a lifelong journey and we will continue to share updates on our progress. Our actions must be sustained and focused on keeping the momentum of enabling change now and for future generations. 

Last, personally this work is the most fulfilling of my career. There are days I am exhausted.  There are days I need help.  Yet there are many days I overflow with pride in our team.  I am most hopeful about the work ahead and seeing the early fruits of this work while challenging us each day to do more.

We were honored to sit down with Dr. Hildreth to discuss the challenges and opportunities we are facing at this pivotal moment in history. In addition to recounting his inspiring personal story, he shared many profound insights about the COVID-19 pandemic and the state of American healthcare. 

The COVID-19 Vaccine & Racial Disparities in Healthcare: A Q&A with Dr. James Hildreth

In August, we announced that Dr. James Hildreth had joined our newly formed Advisory Board as one of its first two anchor members. Dr. Hildreth’s extensive healthcare expertise has been invaluable as we’ve sought to guide Alto into the future and continue reimagining the pharmacy experience. 

A Fascinating Chat with Dr. James Hildreth

Dr. Hildreth is the President and Chief Executive Officer of Meharry Medical College—one of the nation’s oldest and largest historically Black academic health sciences centers. He is internationally renowned for his decades of influential HIV research and is deeply entrenched in our current global health challenge as a member of the FDA’s COVID-19 Vaccine Review Committee.

Can you tell us about your background and professional journey?

I grew up in a small town in Arkansas. It was one of those towns where if the two traffic signals were synchronized, you could drive right through and not even notice it. My father passed away when I was eleven years old. Quite honestly, because we were poor and Black, my father received very little medical attention. That was what prompted me to become interested in medicine.

I had no role models to look to, so I went to the library and read books about medicine. At age thirteen, I read a series of books that ranked your chances of getting into various medical schools. One of the universities was head and shoulders above all the rest, so my life’s work became getting into Harvard University.

To make a long story short, I got scholarships to Harvard, Princeton, Brown, Yale, Stanford, and many other places. But because my research had shown that Harvard was the place to go, that’s where I went. I got a job at the medical school, and the professor who ran the lab was also from Arkansas. He took me under his wing, and suddenly I wanted to be an immunologist. 

It was too late to change my major, but I was hooked. I applied for and was awarded a Rhodes scholarship in 1978, becoming the first Rhodes scholar from Arkansas who was Black. I got my Ph.D. in Immunology then went to Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. 

I planned to become a transplant surgeon until I met my very first patient. She was an African American woman with HIV who had just given birth to a baby who also tested positive. At the time, all we could do was watch them die, and that impacted me deeply enough to change my trajectory. I became an HIV researcher, and I have been studying HIV for the last thirty-eight years. 

I have been President of Meharry Medical College for five years. I feel that my life has come full circle because Meharry’s mission is to give opportunities to individuals who otherwise wouldn’t have them. 

Can you tell us more about Meharry’s mission?

Meharry was founded in 1876, but the story is that in 1826, a young, white teenage boy named Samuel Meharry was driving his salt wagon in the backwoods of Tennessee. His wagon got stuck in the mud, so he knocked on the door of a nearby cabin. An African American family greeted him, gave him a place to stay for the night, and helped him on his way. He promised them that if he ever had any resources, he would do something for Black people. 

Sure enough, fifty years later, he and his four brothers made a gift to a central Tennessee college to start a medical department for African Americans. That department evolved into Meharry Medical College.

To be leading an organization whose purpose is to give opportunities to people who look like me makes me feel that my life has come full circle. Meharry is one of four Black medical schools in the country, and without us, the face of medicine in this country would look very different. We are very proud of our mission and I’m so happy to be leading the organization at this time. 

Given that you’re on the FDA’s Vaccine Review Committee for COVID-19, what is your perspective on how we’ve handled the pandemic to date?

It’s hard to avoid acknowledging how politics have devastated our response to this pandemic. Viruses don’t respect borders, especially when you’re dealing with a pandemic virus. We should have had a nationwide response from the very beginning. Ideally, the whole country should have shut down for several weeks. That would have saved tens of thousands of lives.

What are your thoughts on how the pandemic might unfold going forward?

In my opinion, we’re entering a frightening period because we’re at the base of an exponential rise in cases. It’s essential to understand that for every case we diagnose, there are probably four, if not eight, cases that go undiagnosed. Many people don’t know they have the virus and are spreading it. 

Our country represents four percent of the global population but twenty percent of the people who are dying. That’s unimaginable to me. When you’re dealing with an airborne pathogen that can be transmitted so easily, it is unacceptable and unethical not to have stronger leadership and mandates in place. 

Can you share any insights on potential vaccines and vaccine distribution?

I’m on the FDA committee that will review the data from the drug companies and make recommendations about approval. In a couple of weeks, we will review the Pfizer vaccine. I can tell you that the data from both Moderna and Pfizer are very compelling. Both vaccines appear to be highly effective.

Neither of these vaccines is what we’d call a “sterilizing vaccine,” They will not prevent a person from getting infected, but they will limit the amount of disease that occurs after infection. The other exciting aspect of these vaccines is that they represent a new type: messenger RNA vaccines. Rather than using a protein for the vaccine, we’re using a message that encodes for the protein. There was some doubt if this new type of vaccine would work in humans, but it does. This development will facilitate future vaccines quite nicely. 

By the spring of next year, there will likely be two vaccines approved for use. The question is: who will get those first forty million doses that become available? Healthcare workers will probably get them first, then people in nursing homes and assisted living facilities. Many experts, myself included, are trying to make the case that those most vulnerable to disease and death should be next in line. The CDC has already worked with the states to develop distribution plans, but they are not in line with that thinking. There are going to be a lot of intense discussions in the coming weeks. 

What are the healthcare topics that get you most excited—or keep you up at night—right now?

The pandemic has revealed something that minority healthcare professionals have known for a long time: there is a wide gap in the health status of Americans. If you are African American or Latinx and live in certain communities, you are much more likely to have certain chronic conditions. This increased risk is related to your zip code, educational attainment, where you work, and what your job might be, but running through all of this is an underlying current of racism. 

We can’t solve the problem until this country has a necessary conversation about the role of racism in every domain of American life. I like the way that Martin Luther King put it. He said that when you have centuries of neglect, suppression, oppression, or denial, there is an interest that accumulates. The answers to these problems are going to be much more expensive and time-consuming than if we had been dealing with them all along. 

No matter what industry we’re in, all of us need to have tough conversations about what race really means. Take, for example, the sequencing of human genomes. African genomes are the ancestral genomes—all of us can link our humanism back to Africa. But of all the hundreds and thousands of genomes that have been sequenced, very few of them come from folks who look like me. 

It’s the same as my experience in medical school in the 1980s. We learned to treat the average, middle-aged white male because that’s who the studies were centered on. The exclusion of certain groups from clinical trials, programs, and conversations has created a wide gap that we now have to close. We need to have every healthcare institution at the table trying to work on it.

On a positive note, as the pandemic reveals these disparities, many organizations are awakening to the fact that there is work to be done. I’m encouraged by what happened after we witnessed the senseless murder of George Floyd. It was a really painful time for me because that could have been me, my son, or my brother. It could have been any one of us. But the response that we witnessed wasn’t just from African Americans and liberals. It seemed to me that people of all different backgrounds and races came together to say that this is unacceptable. It gave me some hope that we can change this and become a better nation.

What opportunities do you see for Alto in the world of healthcare?

I think Alto has a great opportunity to improve people’s quality of life who need to take medications to improve their health status. Before she passed, my mother would complain about how difficult it was to get her prescription medications. The ability to simplify and improve the process for everyone will positively impact a significant population of people. 

I was humbled that you asked me to be in your advisory group. I’m excited about what you’re doing, and I think it’s going to make a big difference for many people. 

As we approach the holidays, I’d like to share something I’ve told my students. The last thing you want to do is create a situation where this is the last holiday you’ll spend with some of your older relatives. Please be mindful that there is a lot of the virus out there, wherever you are in the United States. Please take steps to protect yourselves and your families. Have a wonderful holiday, but if you can, make it virtual.

Note: This interview was conducted in early December 2020. 

If you’re considering fertility treatment for the first time, it’s important to understand the financial hurdles you may be facing. In this article, we’ll explore some of the financial options available and how we at Alto can help. 

Managing the Costs of Fertility Treatment

For hopeful parents who are struggling to conceive, the costs of pursuing fertility treatment can often seem insurmountable. Though assisted reproductive technology (ART) makes it possible for many people experiencing infertility to become parents, the emotional and financial stakes are high. 

If you’re considering fertility treatment for the first time, it’s important to understand the financial hurdles you may be facing. However, there are ways to manage or lower the costs so you can move forward on your path to becoming a parent. In this article, we’ll explore some of the financial options available to intended parents pursuing ART and how we at Alto can help. 

If You Have Health Insurance, Start There

Unfortunately, not all insurance plans cover fertility treatments. As you dig into your plan’s details, you may find that some options are covered with contingencies, while others are not covered at all. It’s best to contact your insurance provider for an in-depth explanation of your fertility coverage. 

Be prepared to ask questions about whether your plan covers diagnostic testing, medications, treatments, and consultations. Ask if there is a cap on coverage or a waiting period required to try certain treatments. You want to walk away with a comprehensive understanding of what your out-of-pocket costs might be.

Several states have enacted legislation that requires insurance providers to cover infertility treatments. The American Society of Reproductive Medicine maintains this online database with information by state.

Many fertility clinics now offer no- or low-interest financing. As you seek out the clinic that’s right for you, inquire about what cost-assistance services are available. It’s perfectly reasonable to seek out a clinic that makes you feel confident and fits your budget.

There are also companies that provide personal loans specifically for fertility treatments, with flexible monthly payment options. At Alto, we’ve worked with companies like Lending Club and CapExMD to help our customers get the fertility medications they need. Most companies allow you to apply online and some even provide budgeting tools on their websites so you can get an idea of what your monthly payments might be. 

There are grants available through government programs, nonprofits, and private companies that can help cover fertility treatment costs. Many are designed to benefit intended parents who demonstrate financial need while others were created to support specific groups, such as veterans or the LGBTQ+ community. There are even some that will award money to those willing to share their infertility story. 

These grants won’t usually cover all of your costs, but they can provide a significant boost. CoFertility keeps a database of fertility grants and other funding opportunities, as does RESOLVE: The National Infertility Association. 

Fertility medications can represent a significant portion of your total treatment costs. At Alto, we’ll always advocate for you to ensure you get the lowest possible prices on your medications. We’ll run a thorough insurance benefits investigation and if your insurer requests a prior authorization, we can work with your doctor’s office to submit it on your behalf. Plus, we’ll remind you to collect any available manufacturer rebates with a monthly email.

If you’re uninsured, we can help you apply for income-based assistance programs like the Compassionate Care Program, which could help you save up to 75% off your fertility medications if you qualify. Even if you are still in the planning stages of your fertility journey, the earlier you can apply to the program, the better. Ideally, you will want to have approval before your fertility prescriptions are sent to your pharmacy. 

We accept ACH (direct) payments and offer a one percent discount for anyone who prefers this option over using their credit card. And don’t forget—with Alto, delivery of your medications is always completely free.

With mail-order pharmacies, you usually have to order your fertility medications all at once to ensure your precisely timed doses don’t get hung up in the mail. Because it’s difficult to predict exactly how much medication you will need, you often end up ordering excess. Not only will these leftovers add to your out-of-pockets costs, but you’ll also end up with wasted medication that you'll have to dispose of when you're done with treatment.

When you fill your prescriptions with Alto, we’ll hand-deliver your medications from our local fulfillment centers. That means we can deliver your medications every few days, avoiding overorders and minimizing how much you spend. 

Finally, we know that your time is the most valuable resource you have, so we’re focused on giving as much back to you as we can. Send us a simple text when you have a question, and keep all your medication information—plus expert advice—at your fingertips using our mobile app. You can also schedule refills and track your shipments from our pharmacy to your doorstep in real time. If you suddenly need to add a day of injections, there’s no need to stress or go running to the pharmacy. We’ll handle the details and coordinate delivery to your doorstep. 

If you’re interested in learning more, you can request a price quote online. Our care team and fertility specialists would be happy to answer your questions about navigating fertility medications. We know that the start of your ART journey can feel full of uncertainty, but we’re here to do whatever we can to make the process easier and more affordable. 

For more on choosing the right fertility pharmacy for your journey, read, “What to Consider When Selecting a Fertility Pharmacy.”

While it’s not always possible to predict the course of your fertility treatment, it can be helpful to set goals and parameters. Is there a maximum number of in vitro fertilization (IVF) cycles you’re willing or able to try? Are there other options you’d like to pursue first, such as intrauterine insemination (IUI)? What are the scenarios where you might try using donors or a gestational carrier, or consider fostering or adoption?

Once you have an idea of your budget, coverage options, and potential out-of-pocket costs, create a roadmap that outlines your treatment goals in relation to your financial, physical, and emotional well-being. 

Remember—dealing with infertility issues can take an emotional toll, especially if some options feel out of reach financially. Know that you are not alone, and there is a community of other hopeful parents you can lean on. Support groups like RESOLVE and The Fertility Tribe offer virtual meetups and online community groups. It’s also essential to lean on loved ones for emotional support during this time. The journey you’re taking isn’t easy, but you certainly won’t be walking it alone. 

Would you like to learn more about how Alto can help you manage your fertility treatment costs? Visit alto.com/fertility or give us a call at 1-800-874-5881. Our team is available 9 am - 9 pm PT Monday - Friday, and 10 am - 6 pm PT on weekends. We’re ready to be your partner through it all, from your first cycle to your last. 

This content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or another qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.

We’re always adding new features to both the mobile and desktop app experiences to save you valuable time, give you control over your medications, and provide transparency into what really goes into pharmacy. Cross “pharmacy” off of your year-end to-do list with the newest features in our app.

Take Control of Your Prescriptions With New Features in the Alto App

Healthcare is complicated, but managing your medications doesn’t have to be.

With holiday travel, family engagements, and end of year insurance submissions, December brings with it both excitement for the new year and a lot of housekeeping. Alto takes the hassle out of pharmacy by making pharmacy convenient and fast — no more standing in line or adding an extra stop to your evening commute. Get a question answered or schedule your next medication delivery with a few quick clicks online or over the phone with the assistance of our friendly Care team.

Download your FSA receipts: No need to keep a paper receipts folder or try to remember which medications you filled when. Alto keeps track of the details so you don’t have to. Your year-end FSA receipts are now available for easy download from both the desktop and mobile apps under “Payment Details.”

Set up a linked bank account: Alto’s commitment to transparency means more choices and more control. In addition to payment via credit or debit card, you can link a bank account to automatically save 1% off every order.

Manage your family’s medications: Eliminate extra trips to the pharmacy and confusion around refill cycles. Set up a family account to view and manage medications for you and your family members from a single account:

View medications for your whole family from one med list

Schedule medications for any family member in one delivery

Request refills and prescription renewals on behalf of your family members

To manage your family members’ medications, you’ll need to link them to your account. Contact our patient care team at 1 (800) 874–5881 to quickly get set up.

New to Alto? Here’s what you can expect from the full Alto app experience:

View all of your current and archived prescriptions along with detailed medication information

Access price information for each medication, including insurance, coupon, and cash pay prices so you always know your options

Schedule deliveries for the date and delivery window of your choice — delivery is always free!

Request refills and enroll in our auto-refill program

Securely message a pharmacist with questions, including in the evenings and on weekends

We want to know what you think about these new features! Email us at feedback@alto.com.

Set automated medication dose reminders and enroll in automatic refills for future deliveries

Today we’re releasing two updates to our mobile app experience to help you stay on track with your medications and never miss your next fill. These new features are a key part of Alto’s goals to provide more control and convenience in managing your medications.

Busy schedules mean it can be hard to remember when to take your medications. Alto’s new Reminders will alert you when it’s time for your next dose. Manage multiple medication schedules throughout the day, and track your progress with a quick tap in the app.

Head to the new Reminders feature in the app’s main menu.

Select the active prescription you’d like to set a reminder for.

Input the specifics of your medication’s schedule: days of the week, times of day, amounts.

The app will send you a push notification at the scheduled time. 

Once you've taken your medication, check off the dose in the app to track your progress.

Set it and forget it with Auto Refills. Turn on Auto Refills when scheduling your next delivery to get your future refills delivered automatically. We’ll reach out to remind you when the next fill is on it’s way so you can review any price changes and make updates to the delivery location or timing if needed.

You can opt into Auto Refills in two ways:

From your Medications list: Open an active prescription in your Medications list. You’ll be able to view medication details, your last copay and next available delivery date, as well as the new Auto Refill option. Turn it on for any medications that you’d like to have future fills delivered automatically.

From your cart: Turn on Auto Refills for any active prescriptions currently in your cart during checkout. Toggle the setting on for any prescriptions with refills remaining.

Auto Refill settings are also available on the Alto desktop app and mobile web experiences (visit app.alto.com). Auto Refills are only available for medications that have refills remaining on the prescription and are not available for controlled substances. Some insurance plans may also limit automatic refills. 

If you are out of refills, you can request a refill from your doctor directly or ask Alto to request one for you via the “Request For Refills” option in the app. 

Download the Alto mobile app from the App Store or Google Play store today.

New From Alto: Medication Reminders & Auto Refills

A personal health journey with hyperthyroidism, Graves’ Disease, and Horner's Syndrome led Alto's Head of Talent to improve the patient pharmacy experience.

Alto's Head of Talent Shares His Personal Health Journey

As a patient, I dreaded my pharmacy experience. So I joined Alto to change it. 

My first sign of hyperthyroidism showed up when I was 20 and my struggle with pharmacies started soon after. It would be more than a decade before I found a way to be a part of solving this industry’s problems.

When I first heard about the opportunity at Alto in 2019, I actually laughed. Why would I want to work at a pharmacy? I hated pharmacies. But the recruiter I was working with convinced me to reconsider and after speaking to Jamie, one of the founders, I understood. Alto was unlike any other pharmacy out there. In fact, they weren’t just a pharmacy. They were on a mission to improve patients’ quality of life. I jumped at the chance to fix a broken industry that is hungry for innovation.

I had just come back from a trip to New York and went for a routine run around the neighborhood. I was so drained after running one mile that I had to stop and sit down. This didn’t make sense; at 20, I was in the best shape of my life. As the next few weeks went on, the symptoms worsened: severe chest pain, shortness of breath, and anxiety attacks. Being the stubborn athlete I am, I pushed through it, until one day, I blacked out during a run and woke up lying face down in the dirt. Around that same time, I developed a lazy eye and finally decided to go to the doctor.

After that delayed visit I was diagnosed with hyperthyroidism, Graves’ Disease, and Horner's Syndrome. My standing heart rate was 105, or about 50 BPM more than it should have been! I'm so thankful for my family members and the doctors who acted quickly to get me medical care. While my treatment plan was straight-forward, my experience as a patient on prescription medications became a nightmare. I quickly learned how inconvenient, impersonal, and non-patient-centric the pharmaceutical industry was.

I tried pharmacy after pharmacy, and the issues and frustrations remained the same. My script would be sent to the wrong address, or I’d receive the wrong dosage and brand of medication, even though my medication never changed! It became so routine that once a month, I’d block off two hours to talk through my refill requests with the pharmacy. But like clockwork, the same problems would reoccur—year after year after year. Having told my story to tons of other patients and caretakers, I know I’m not alone in this experience.

Like any disappointed customer in the 2000s, I took to the internet to learn more. What I found was alarming. The NPS scores for the leading pharmacies are abysmal. CVS Pharmacy, one of the largest retail pharmacies, has an NPS score of -10. Yes, negative ten. It's also estimated that up to 50% of medications are not taken as prescribed, creating up to $300 billion in avoidable drug costs annually. Even worse, it's estimated that more than 125,000 preventable deaths each year can be attributed to medication non-adherence. That's three times more than deaths from car accidents nationally!

While there was comfort in knowing others felt my pain and were experiencing the same frustrations, I was angry that there wasn't anything being done about it. I was frustrated, both as a patient and as a civilian, and didn’t know how to try to solve the problem. 

Meanwhile, after graduating college, I began my career in Michigan, where I’m from. Working for a recruiting agency, Aerotek, I was hiring for all sorts of roles—from machine operators to janitors—but I always had an interest in tech.  I found out about Barracuda Networks, a security tech company with an office in Ann Arbor. I originally joined to build their data protection division from 20 to 250. Their office was about 20 people and it needed to grow to 250. I had a ton to learn—when I started, I didn’t even know what a software engineer was! My role evolved quickly, eventually broadening to manage all tech recruiting across the U.S. and later, to building their first international recruiting team.

After almost five years, I started to look at other companies. Quora had been a long-time favorite product of mine. I loved that they connected knowledge with people all over the world. The perspectives I found were genuine, diverse, and fascinating. On Quora, there are professors, industry experts, and people who just got out of prison, sharing their knowledge and experience. I joined Quora to grow their team and jumped into the consumer internet space for the first time. Working there, I learned how to refine and scale processes to enable hiring for balanced and diverse teams. At a certain point though, I was ready for a new challenge, to move outside of an advertising-based business model, and to be in a steep learning curve again.

I had no idea where I wanted to go next. Looking around the Bay Area, I felt that with so many smart, capable people in tech, we could be doing more. I didn’t agree with a lot of what I was seeing, especially in terms of the kinds of problems that were getting the most investment, time, and resources. I’d spent almost 10 years building my career and didn’t even know if I wanted to stay in tech. I’d lost touch with a sense of purpose and meaningful legacy. 

I knew I wanted to have a lot of personal impact, and a mission I completely aligned with. I wanted a company where employees care about the lives they’re touching, the people they’re working with, and the communities they are impacting. And I wanted to work with a small team and grow it. I didn’t know if I could find all of that within Silicon Valley.

Then I got introduced to Alto. I toured the pharmacy, met with the leadership team, and learned about their ambitious plans for growth, and how I could be part of making those happen successfully. The things I noticed during my interview process with Alto are still very real today as an employee, especially the level of empathy people bring to work. Alto was the first place I interviewed where people were truly getting to know me, and understanding the motivation behind my past professional decisions.

I joined Alto in August of 2019 as their Head of Talent. I'm grateful to have the opportunity to work for a company whose culture, people, and mission are centered on supporting others and making a change in an industry that hasn't seen any significant transformation in the last 50 years. We’re seeking to understand but also wanting to be principled in our approach, and not compromise on patient health outcomes. 

Over the last year, the recruiting team has grown from 4 to 30, and our primary focus has been embedding solutions focused on building a diverse workforce. From implementing our first early talent apprenticeships, to building an inclusive hiring process by creating a training culture, we've grown the company from 180 to 750 across 4 states and 7 office locations.

This industry serves a diverse population and I’m learning a ton along the way. Working at Alto allows me to be a part of creating a healthcare solution that will truly be patient-centric. I want to continue to surround myself with people who have the same passion and bring their unique experiences, thoughts, and ideas to help us build tomorrow's pharmacy and fulfill medicine's true purpose: to improve quality of life—for everyone who needs it.

If you have any questions about Alto, or are interested in joining our team, please reach out via LinkedIn.

Alto’s Head of Talent Shares His Personal Health Journey

In this post, we'll share how we identified the problem of failing cypress seeds, what the culprit was, and three ways to make seeding test data more robust.

How to Debug Slow and Failing Cypress Seeds

End-to-end test failing before it even begins? Here’s how we timed, debugged, and sped up our seed data.

At Alto, we use Cypress to test our Rails application end-to-end. As our application grows, so does our end-to-end test suite — along with the seed data it requires. This led us recently to a perplexing problem:  when run in CircleCI, our end-to-end tests would mysteriously time out during the seed step, causing them to fail and block deploys.

Seeds can be painful to debug. They’re typically set up through a single request and, depending on how thorough the tests are, call upon most of the models involved in the application. If a model throws, say, a validation error because of bad seed data, you'll see it in your Cypress logs. If a model hangs, the request often doesn't show up in the logs at all. There's no status code, no error message—all you know is that somewhere, somehow, some process is failing to finish.

In this post, I’ll share how we identified the problem, what the culprit was, and three ways to make seeding test data more robust.

To Identify the Problem, Focus on Your Logs

We started by comparing logs from our failing CircleCI runs with those from local test runs. Turns out, our CircleCI logs in failed runs stopped after a specific log message. 

Blog

2020 Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Report

New Articles

Celebrating Women at Alto Pharmacy

Béquet Confections: The Story Behind Alto Pharmacy’s Caramel

How Your Family History Affects Your Heart Health

COVID-19

What the COVID-19 Vaccine Means for Those With HIV

The COVID-19 Vaccine & Racial Disparities in Healthcare: A Q&A with Dr. James Hildreth

Engineering at Alto

Creating Sandboxes: How to Make It Easy for Your Engineering and Product Teams

How to Debug Slow and Failing Cypress Seeds

Fertility

Rev. Dr. Stacey L. Edwards-Dunn on Her Mission To Improve Black Fertility Care

Managing the Costs of Fertility Treatment

Health

Cholesterol 101: The Good vs. The Bad (And What to Do About It)

Why Gut Health Is Key (and How To Improve Yours)

Products

New From Alto: Medication Reminders & Auto Refills

Take Control of Your Prescriptions With New Features in the Alto App

Company

Alto Pharmacy Announced as One of Forbes Best Startup Employers

Diversity At Alto: Building an Inclusive Healthcare Company and Culture

Culture

5 Black Healthcare Leaders to Know

Alto's Head of Talent Shares His Personal Health Journey

Industry

An Inside Look at a Sales Career with Alto

Concerned about Mail Delays Tying up Your Prescriptions? There’s a Better Way.

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