Dialforhealth India Ltd, a subsidiary of Cadila Healthcare and Unity Chemists & Druggists Pvt. Ltd, a company engaged in business of pharma retail and wholesale trade, has entered into a joint venture to set up a chain of pharmacy network in Gujarat.

The venture, Dialforhealth Unity Ltd, already has a dozen franchisees in Vadodara and plans to rope in about 250 retail outlets within the first year. According to Prashant Pandya, Director of Dialforhealth Unity Ltd, the outlets would offer value added services to the customers and marginally improve pharmacy practices. The company would rope in laboratories, MRI scan centres, X-Ray clinics and other healthcare concerns to offer doscounted services to its customers. Further, the outlets would provide services like home delivery, free health check ups, information on dosage, drugs, diseases etc.

"Dialforhealth Unity chain shops will deliver professional pharmacy services to our members and customers. We will offer managed care expertise, presentation skills together with professional service to our members that will attract more customers. We are also planning to introduce new territory in pharmaceutical care with the advent of our "Counseling to Customer" program," said Pandya.

Dahyabhai Patel, Director of Unity Chemists & Druggists Pvt. Ltd. was hopeful that the company would provide the desired support to retail pharmacies to meet the requirement and challenges of the fast changing retail scenario. V. K. Sharma, General

Manager Operations, Dialforhealth noted there was a gap between today's customer expectations and the offerings by the pharma retail trade in general.