Money Talks

With our guest Robert Dozier, Executive Director of the Mississippi Independent Pharmacist Association, we’ll be suggesting different methods to save money on prescription medications. Some of our tips may just be a change in the way you pay for your prescriptions other methods require you to speak with your doctor and pharmacist to determine what is right for you.

Tips gathered from Consumer Reports May 2018 Issue concerns prescription drug prices. https://www.consumerreports.org/drug-prices/shop-around-for-better-drug-prices/

1. Check different pharmacies: locally owned, chain and mail order. The cost of the same prescription drug can vary by hundreds of dollars at different pharmacies, even within the same town.
2. You can sometimes save money by not using your insurance but by paying cash. Ask your pharmacist how much you would pay if you didn’t use insurance
3. Look for coupon online. To see whether a drugmaker offers discounts for an expensive medication you take, check its website or go to the government's list of discount drug programs.                  We’ll have that website on our website: https://www.medicare.gov/pharmaceutical-assistance-program/
4. You may have to ask pharmacists some direct questions. That’s because they’re sometimes bound by “gag clauses” in contracts with insurers that prohibit them from suggesting cheaper alternatives without first being directly asked by a consumer.
5. Ask your doctor whether you need a drug in the first place. You might not. In an April 2017 nationally representative Consumer Reports survey of more than 1,000 adults who take prescription drugs, 70 percent of those who asked their doctor if they could cut down on their drugs were able to eliminate at least one.
6. Ask your doctor whether a related but less expensive drug is an option. If a drug is necessary, ask how much it will cost.
   1. A more recent Consumer Reports survey found that most doctors don’t regularly talk about drug costs with patients. So you might need to take the lead. When you do, ask whether a less costly drug might work as well. For example, generic drugs have the same active ingredients as brand-name ones, they're regulated in the same way by the Food and Drug Administration, and they cost 80 to 85 percent less.
   2. Some drugs, prescribed so infrequently that when their patent expires, no company applies to the FDA to make a low-cost generic version. But a few years ago some drug companies started seeing a business opportunity in these overlooked drugs and began purchasing the rights to them—then jacking up the prices.
7. Look into 90-day prescriptions. That's especially true for medication to treat chronic conditions such as high blood pressure and diabetes. Larger numbers of pill reduce how often you need to cover co-pays if you use insurance.
8. Ask your healthcare provider whether an older drug would work just as well. Drugmakers often tweak older drugs, then apply for a new patent, allowing them to charge more for the “improved” product. But those changes are often minor—a slightly larger dose, or time-released—and the new drugs aren’t much better than the original..
9. Another option for people with high-deductible plans is to look into health savings accounts, or HSAs. They allow people with high-deductible plans to spend up to $6,900 a year in tax-exempt dollars on out-of-pocket medical expenses.
10. Compare plans before you enroll in Medicare. When you first sign up near your 65th birthday or during open enrollment in the fall, use Medicare's plan-finder tool or call 800-MEDICARE to see how well different plans cover the drugs you take and whether you’re likely to go over $3,750 in drug costs.