In these tough economic times, we're facing shrinking buying power. Especially hard hit are people on fixed income and dealing with cut backs on what Medicare will cover. What can they do when they have trouble paying for their medications? What if it was you?
Pharmacists are concerned that people will cut back doses, rather than their budgets, potentially putting themselves at risk of dangerously ineffective drugs. Is there a solution to the increasing cost of medication, including generics?
Read what alternatives may be available.
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In terms of people cutting back on prescriptions because of the cost, a doctor told me one time that many prescriptions cost less at the higher dosage. For instance, a 50 mg tablet costs much less than two 25 mg tablets, and that for many of those medicines, cutting them in half will work.
(Clearly this won't work for capsules or for drugs that are time-released.)
If you take a prescription that's in any kind of tablet form, it's worth asking about. Could a higher dosage split in two actually save your money? Your doctor or your pharmacist will know.
There are some cautions -- and some doctors think that unless the pills are split perfectly, a dosage may not be exact. But they admit that the scored lines on pills are for precisely this purpose. And two large HMOs are encouraging their patients to think along these lines to help save money.
Here's a good article on pill-splitting:
http://www.healthyplace.com/communities/depression/treatment/antidepressants/pill_splitting_2.asp
And here's the note about the HMOs:
http://www.elderweb.com/home/node/1003
December 25, 2008 - 6:00pmThis Comment
This issue will hit harder on people's wallets because we are in the midst of economic crisis and cutting dosage to save money is a trend that will continue. But did you know that the most prescribed drugs in America according to the CDC are antidepressants? YES! Anti-depressants are the most commonly prescribed drugs in the U.S., totaling 118 million prescriptions in 2005 and I am sure that number has gone up.
We need to ask ourselves why are we taking anti-depressants? Are doctors over precribing them? Is the medical community failing to consider options to these drugs?
http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/07/09/antidepressants/index.html
This link lists the top most prescribed drugs from a 2005 report. Pretty scarry trend when you think about it. http://www.rxlist.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=79509
In regards to the issue of generic drugs, I think they will be the only ones approved by health plans (with exceptions) and people will continue to shift their care to more non-traditional treatments such as: accupunture, holistic treatments, homeopathy, etc.
On an previous posting on generic versus brand, I shared my concerns. It is a national priority to start thinking about shifting to generic drugs to reduce cost and save our healthcare system. Big pharma continues to fight hard to keep people believing that brand name is better. Most brand drugs will end up as generics at some point according to FDA patent agreements and regulations. There are several drugs already waiting for the timetable to be available for open manufacturing.
The link shows the politics around this issue including consumer perception about generics
http://money.cnn.com/2006/06/15/news/companies/zoloft_zocor/index.htm
December 24, 2008 - 1:55amThis Comment