Wellness

[aprildreams]

Go to goodrx dot com and put in the name of the drug and your zip code and it will give you the best prices in your area. I just put in this med and my zip code and it was anywhere from $28 to $50.

[Campion]

I worked in pharma for years. I know the cost it takes to make a new drug, only to have it seven years or less on patent to recoup the heavy cost (billion or more per drug.)

So why have costs skyrocketed, and...many important drugs are in short supply, especially chemo. This is something going on.

I believe the crazy pricing, and I also was stung this year by a five buck drug going to $250, is a response to forced controlled reimbursement by insurance companies with ACA and Medicare. Someone needs to look into this. It is out out control, as OP says, but not for the reasons of "greed." It's for the reasons of interference. It's out of balance. Why?

[gardeniarose]

My husband takes Nadolol. That is a generic. His prescription has not gone up at all. I could see the price going up for a brand name but not that much for a generic. Why did Walmart stop covering it? I think someone at Walmart might have made a mistake. I would check with them again.

[Cookie06]

Wow since reading this post it prompted me to do a little research in regards to the donut hole in Medicare Part D drug coverage. I found this piece of information interestng which makes drug costs for Veterans much cheaper than for Medicare Part D patients. This information was provided by CMS (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services).

"By the design of the program (Medicare Part D), the federal government is not permitted to negotiate prices of drugs with the drug companies, as federal agencies do in other programs. The Department of Veterans Affairs, which is allowed to negotiate drug prices and establish a formulary, has been estimated to pay between 40% and 58% less for drugs, on average, than Medicare Part D.

Estimating how much money could be saved if Medicare had been allowed to negotiate drug prices, economist Dean Baker gives a "most conservative high-cost scenario" of $332 billion between 2006 and 2013 (approximately $50 billion a year), and a "middle-cost scenario" of $563 billion in savings "for the same budget window".

Hmmmm do you think maybe the drug companies might have Congress in their back pocket? Well it is very complicated, very frustrating and costing many of us thousands of dollars each year. I drop into the donut hole in June of each year and the cost of just two of my prescriptions goes from about $25 to about $300 each month. Ouch. That could be a car payment???

[gardeniarose]

I just called my Walmart( I am in Florida) Nadolol is 33.95 for one month. We have our prescriptions filled at Publix. I assume the price went up there too. We pay a 7.00 co -pay per generic prescription so our insurance picked up the price increase at the same co- pay price to us.(which probably means our insurance premium will go up next year) I never noticed the price increase because our co-pay is the same. Seems a shame that this could be a penny one year and go up that much. I think drug companies get away with raising prices because people like me with a set co-pay don't notice. I am sorry they are doing this to your mother.

[onlyshopsonline]

My insurance doesn't want to offer full coverage any longer for one of my meds. I went from paying $25 to $140. They keep insisting that I switch to a cheaper generic, but my particular medication is not offered in generic. And, the other brands didn't work for me.

I am taking what my doctor wants me to take. I did go to the drug website and found a discount coupon that is good until August. And, the generic form of my med is due out in the summer of 2016. So, I'll keep looking for discounts until then.

They would rather force me out of a medication that is working for me, and have me end up in the hospital with complications from not taking the medication....seems a lot more expensive to me! But, then, isn't this starting to look more and more like the "death panels" that everyone was talking about before the unAffordable Care Act took place?

The insurance companies are going to decide who lives or dies based on ability to pay for a medication or for care. Our out-of-pocket insurance costs have gone up several thousand dollars a year since the health care bill took effect, and I now find that we are postponing quite a bit of our health care because it is just becoming too expensive.

[Cookie06]

Who reallly knows what the Affordable Care Act would have been if left in it's entirety. It was so chopped up and changed, that we have no idea what good things or bad things were left out or changed. I know for our family, the reduction in premiums has been the difference between being able to have health insurance or not having any health insurance due to the outrageous premiums charged. And my husband just had a colonoscopy and it cost us about $38.00 for lab fees instead of about $2500 including lab fees. As it is considered a preventative procedure. I can't complain about the ACA.

[Dorothy11]

The US is the only industrialized country in the world that does not have socialized medicine. We pay way more for medications than any other country, and have a infant mortality rate up there with third world countries.

The ACA is a step in the right direction, as more people can afford medical care, but it is still based on a for-profit medical industry. Take a look at health care stocks and mutual funds - they are soaring.

[Annabellethecat66]

How sad that this country (and it's people) vote so much not necessarily what is good for everyone but mostly what works for themselves.

I see it over and over. Most of my friends are my age (almost 70 years old). Most are in upper middle class. These are friends and people I went to high school with that I stay in touch with.

We pretty much agree that in the past maybe 10 years have gone further and fruther into the have's and have not's (as I posted recently here).

I have a dear friend (as stated) who cannot get any health insurance because (according to the ACA she makes too much money). Guess what.....she doesn't.

She is one of the many, many people who fall between the cracks.

I'm lucky. My late husband left me with plenty of money that I don't have to worry about much.

However, in my teen years I lived with my sister. There were days when we didn't have any food. I know what it's like to have to worry about where you're going to live and what you're going to eat.

That feeling never leaves you, no matter what you now have.

I talk to strangers all of the time. I've sat and listened to people who have said they used to be able to afford health care, no longer since the ACA thing.

Like I said, most of the people I know have nothing to gain or loose with this health care THING.

I'm so glad some of you are benefiting from it. I'm happy for those of you who are happy about it.

However, I can't help thinking about the man I met in the waiting room while getting a biopsy done. He apologized for getting choaked up about his health care situation.

It's nice to see some are benefiting from this. I'm sorry but I've met people who are definitely not benefiting (and have lost) due to this fiasco.

[poregirl]

On 2/6/2015 aprildreams said:

Go to goodrx dot com and put in the name of the drug and your zip code and it will give you the best prices in your area.

right on!