Prescription drugs are a vital part of the healthcare routine. For many Illinoisans, paying for prescription drugs has become a serious challenge. Medical financial hardship is common among adults in the USA, especially among the uninsured (Yabroff et al., 2019). Medical specialists try to reduce the costs of prescribed drugs. I could prescribe generic medicine instead of brand options to minimize cost or help the patient get the medication at the lowest price possible. It has been found that essential generic medicine with established clinical benefits reduces barriers to timely generic drug availability (Patel, 2018). Moreover, I can use a tier reduction to request lower cost sharing. In tiering exception requests for medications such as Lipitor and Atorvastatin, it can be stated that drugs for treating the patient’s condition that are on lower tiers are ineffective or dangerous. This will help in cost reduction for patients, but they will be able to have the best medicine option possible.
Two resources are aimed at medical cost reduction in Illinois. The first is House Bill 119. The Bill was signed in 2021 and established a prescription drug repository program. This program formalizes the legal process for donating unused prescription drugs to certified pharmacies or health departments. The second resource is the Pharmacy Benefit Manager Transparency Act, which passed the Senate committee in 2022 that focuses on reducing drug prices (Dillow, 2021). According to Wineinger et al. (2019), top-selling brand-name prescription drugs show continuous price increases. Thus, the Act and Bill will control and reduce those prices.
Moreover, patients can use services such as GoodRx that help them find the lowest-cost pharmacy for their prescriptions. This service is free of charge, does not require registration, and provides coupons (GoodRx, 2022). I could check such services and advise the patient of the best available options. I would check the prices for branded OTC medicine (such as Pepcid), and if those prices increase with prescription, I could recommend them instead of prescribing. This will help in cost reduction imposed on patients. Overall, I could help in the cost reduction of prescribed medicine in Illinois by using a tier reduction for expensive generic drugs and prescribing cheaper generic medication instead of branded ones. I would recommend services such as GoodRx to the patients. I would support policies such as the Act and House Bill that would benefit all the patients.
References
Dillow, K. (2021). New laws aim to lower prescription drug prices in Illinois. Wsiltv.com. Web.
GoodRX (2022). How GoodRx works. Web.
Patel, M. R., Press, V. G., Gerald, L. B., Barnes, T., Blake, K., Brown, L. K., Costello, R. W., Crim, C., Forshag, M., Gershon, A. S., Goss, C. H., Han, M. K., Lee, T. A., Sweet, S. & Gerald, J. K. (2018). Improving the affordability of prescription medications for people with chronic respiratory disease. An Official American Thoracic Society Policy Statement.American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine 198(11). Web.
Senate Commerce Science. Pharmacy benefit manager transparency act of 2022 [PDF document]. Web.
Wineinger N. E., Zhang Y., Topol E. J. (2019). Trends in prices of popular brand-name prescription drugs in the United States. JAMA Netw Open 2(5).
Yabroff, K.R., Zhao, J., Han, X., et al. (2019). Prevalence and correlates of medical financial hardship in the USA. J GEN INTERN MED 34, pp. 1494–1502.