A new pharmacy has opened in downtown Lacombe.

The I.D.A is open for business, right next to Family Medical Associates on 51st Street, offering unique areas of services and specialities ranging from compounding, to long-term care and home health care, to expertise in areas of diabetes management and much more.

Owner John Eshak has been a Pharmacist since 2004, and says he wanted to be a business owner so he could offer the public the things he values, including efficiency.

"There's lots of times where people have to wait for half an hour or 45 minutes, when it could have easily taken just 10. It's more customizable in here, where we can focus on the specific need for a patient, instead of applying a cookie cutter procedure that might fit some and not others."

Eshak moved to Canada in 2003 from Egypt and has loved his new home ever since, having been a pharmacist in Vegreville, Drayton Valley, Edmonton, and Red Deer.

He says the most important thing about being a pharmacist to him, is treating his patients like family.

"That elderly lady who comes in. That's my mom. She's struggling to understand what she needs to be taking, and why certain things are more important. In the last place I worked, I had people saying oh my goodness you remembered my name, I must be coming here a lot. But it's not them; I just like to remember people's names."

Eshak says his goal is to offer the quickest service and the cheapest prices, because those are values that he finds important.