This Pharmacist Fills the Needs of a Special Clientele : Medicine: Vee Mell is well-known for catering to people infected with HIV. Her store frequently carries customers through months of insurance delays and other problems related to the disease.

Pharmacist Vee Mell says she first started seeing that look in 1987--the terror-numbed faces of young men who learned they had the AIDS virus. She’d leave the counter and offer a hug. Working in a pharmacy near heavily gay West Hollywood, she doled out a lot of hugs.

“I was a pharmacist for 22 years. I had seen it all--until I met my first AIDS patients,” Mell said. “Instantly I knew. I met my first 10 people and I said to my husband, ‘I’m going to open my own pharmacy.’ ”

A year later, Mell, 50, opened Vee’s Pharmacy in West Hollywood to cater to people infected with HIV, the human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS. Today, the pharmacy is famous around town for that specialty--one of a few area drugstores that mainly serve an HIV-positive clientele--and as a place where comfort is dispensed as readily as antiviral drugs.

“She’s like a pharmacist and a counselor combined,” said Travis Emery, a construction consultant who cried with Mell when his condition was diagnosed as HIV six years ago. “Throughout my struggle to stay healthy I couldn’t imagine someone being more compassionate and supportive and non-judgmental.”

Mell, a donor and activist in a number of local AIDS groups, also has won plenty of fans for her willingness to supply expensive drugs such as AZT first and worry about money later.

The store frequently carries customers through months of insurance delays, and staffers often battle on their behalf with MediCal, the state’s insurer for the poor, and with private firms that don’t want to cover certain AIDS-related prescriptions. Lots of times, the pharmacy doesn’t get paid at all, Mell said.

“Somebody has to do it. It costs me a lot of money to carry the receivables for these guys. They need it every month and they can’t wait for the insurance company,” she said. “Nobody goes out of here without their medication.”

On a recent afternoon, a young man who is a regular customer argued with a cashier about charging for a $32 case of an over-the-counter nutrition drink. He eventually appealed to Mell, who let him take the drink. She doubted she’d ever be paid for it, adding that she paid the man’s insurance premiums for several months last year so he could continue to get AIDS drugs.

That kind of mom-and-pop approach, paired with Mell’s advocacy work, has won widespread notice in a city with the highest per-capita AIDS rate in the nation.

In her office, Mell flies about, showing off treasures from “my guys,” as she calls them, the HIV-infected young men who make up 90% of her business and her crusade.

On the street, she stops to hug strangers sporting the red AIDS-awareness ribbon that she always wears, and she lectures her children and their friends about AIDS.

Mell--who has never had AIDS in her family--might not be the obvious pick for AIDS activist. “I used to say I wish there was something I felt this great need to do something for--some cause,” she said.

Now she sits on the boards of groups such as Project Angel Food, the AIDS Health Care Foundation and Aid for AIDS, and contributes liberally to Aids Project Los Angeles and the Gay and Lesbian Community Services Center. Last year, she served on a West Hollywood City Council task force set up to study the city’s response to the AIDS crisis. She is also the new president of the city’s Chamber of Commerce.

“I think these guys fulfill an emotional need in me. It’s like a mothering instinct to hold them in my arms and tell them it’ll be OK when they’re having a down day,” she said.

Customers say that Mell has helped steer them to alternative sources of AIDS drugs not yet approved in the United States. Because she specializes in HIV, she keeps tabs on AIDS drugs approved overseas, many of which eventually make their way here.

“She’s been very helpful in helping people get access to things that aren’t even approved yet,” said Scott Hitt, a Beverly Hills AIDS physician who also sits on the boards of APLA and the Gay and Lesbian Community Services Center. “She’s been very helpful in terms of alternative treatments.”

Vee’s Pharmacy also provides intravenous compounds for homebound patients too sick to swallow pills or eat, a rare service for a retail drugstore. The IV solutions are prepared in a specially equipped room built last year at the back of the pharmacy. IV delivery is offered around the clock.

The pharmacy is not alone in going to great lengths for HIV-positive customers, whose monthly bills for AIDS drugs can easily top $1,500. Doctors and AIDS activists also cited Capitol Drugs, a homeopathic drugstore in West Hollywood, and Bob’s Pharmacy and AdRx nearby in Los Angeles as having good records for serving an HIV-positive clientele.

Specializing in AIDS can be lucrative because of the enormous amount of medication patients must use. “We are all in business to make money. My guys know that. But I am not out to be greedy,” Mell said. “And I can give back to the community in exchange for the profit margin.”

Drugstores dealing primarily with HIV-infected customers also face unique problems. People with AIDS are sometimes dropped from insurance programs or get too sick to keep the jobs that provide their medical benefits. Although MediCal takes over in such cases, it often balks at paying for drugs used differently from their approved purposes, which is common in AIDS treatment, said Kevin Williams, a Century City physician who treats patients infected with HIV.

Mell estimates that a fifth of her $4 million in annual sales will have to be written off as business losses because of insurers’ refusal to reimburse her, and medicine for which she doesn’t charge. Bob Shipe, owner of Bob’s Pharmacy, said he too has paid insurance premiums for customers, waived patients’ out-of-pocket charges or covered their bills for months at a time so they could get drugs.

These specialty pharmacies also learn to cope with the anger and the burning emotional stress that often accompanies AIDS, said Bruce Senesac, a co-owner of CapitolDrug, which has several employees who are HIV-positive.

“People will come in and if their doctor hasn’t called in (their prescription) then it’s somebody’s fault and they get irate. Or they may have reactions because of the kinds of drugs they’re on,” he said. “The issues seem to be more exaggerated.”

And there is death. Of Mell’s 100 original customers, all but six have died. “I lose 40% of my client base every year,” she said quietly. “And it’s replaced by new customers.”

Longtime customers said the pharmacy has been a haven from their own fears and rejection elsewhere.

“The day that your doctor tells you you have to go on AZT--that’s really scary,” said a 36-year-old model who has AIDS. “Going into a store to get that is daunting. You’ve got all these emotions going on and here you are dealing with a stranger and wondering, ‘Are they cool about this?’ ”

At Vee’s, they are.