TrueScripts, a pharmacist-founded, team member owned pharmacy benefit manager (PBM), today announced that Byron Mickle became President & Chief Executive Officer effective October 1, 2026. Mickle joined TrueScripts as President in March 2026 as part of a planned leadership succession for Dean Merder.
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Byron Mickle, President and Chief Executive Officer
Merder, who has led TrueScripts since 2021, is now the Executive Advisor to the Chairman. In this role he will support leadership continuity, strengthen board governance, and provide oversight of the next phase of the company’s employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) at TrueScripts.
Merder joined TrueScripts in 2018 as Chief Experience Officer and was named President in 2020 and President and Chief Executive Officer in 2021. Over eight years he guided the company’s expansion from a regional prescription benefit manager to a national one, built out its leadership organization, and led TrueScripts through its transition to team member ownership in 2023.
” It has been the privilege of my career to lead such an incredible team. Eight years ago, I joined a company with a strong conviction about how prescription benefits ought to work, and a team determined to prove it. Watching that conviction grow into a national organization owned by the people who serve our clients and members every day has been extraordinary. Byron brings the experience to extend that impact further, and I am excited for what this team will accomplish under his leadership,” said Dean Merder, Executive Advisor to the Chairman of TrueScripts.
Mickle brings more than 35 years in pharmacy benefit management, with experience across both the largest PBMs in the industry and the transparent, pass-through model built as an alternative to them. He spent 15 years as Chief Growth Officer & SVP at Navitus Health Solutions, where the company grew from roughly 500,000 covered lives to more than nine million lives during his tenure as CGO.
“I have spent over 35 years in this industry, and I have rarely seen an organization hold to its principles the way TrueScripts has under Dean’s leadership. The foundation he and this team built is the reason I am here. My job is to carry it forward and widen its reach, so that more employers, government entities and health plans can experience the level of care this team has been delivering for over a decade,” said Byron Mickle, President and Chief Executive Officer of TrueScripts.
TrueScripts was founded in Washington, Indiana, in 2014 on a belief that employers and the members they cover deserved full visibility into what their prescriptions cost and why. The pharmacist-founded company has operated on a fully transparent, pass-through model ever since.
“TrueScripts started because we believed the person picking up a prescription deserved better than what the industry was giving them. That hasn’t changed, and it isn’t going to. Dean spent eight years proving the idea works, and today the people who built this company own it. I’m grateful to Dean, and I’m excited for what comes next under Byron,” said Nathan Gabhart, RPh, Founder of TrueScripts.
Both Byron’s and Dean’s appointments reflect the company’s long-term commitment to full transparency and to doing what is right for clients and members as their trusted PBM partner into the future.
ABOUT TRUESCRIPTS
TrueScripts is a pharmacist-founded, team member owned, fully transparent and pass-through pharmacy benefit manager. Our mission is to build lasting relationships by providing prescription benefit expertise at a personal and customized level to ensure optimum value at the lowest possible cost. We are committed to lowering prescription drug spending, achieving clinically effective outcomes, and consistently delivering Amazing Care.
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