Patients Fail to Pick Up 6.8% of Rxs

I was surprised by the higher abandonment rate for the drugs with co-pays of more than $99. These drugs tend to be high-cost, but unique drugs for often debilitating conditions. I am curious if patients in commercial health plans often do not find enough value in these drugs or whether they find other sources.

Current e-prescribing systems do not notify the physician when a patient does not pick up their prescription. This increases the importance of systems that integrate medical and pharmacy data and notify physicians about patients without recommended medication therapy for key conditions.

from PharmaLive: http://pharmalive.com/news/index.cfm?articleID=617277&categoryid=9&newsletter=1

"A prescription is defined as abandoned when a patient submits a retail prescription to a pharmacy but never actually picks it up.

Looking at U.S. commercial plan claims for 2008, Wolters Kluwer Health found that prescription abandonment increased by 34 percent nationally compared to 2006 --- jumping from an average of 5.15 percent in 2006 to 6.8 percent in 2008. It also found that abandonment increased as the amount of the co-pay increased, especially for new prescriptions. For example, new prescriptions with co-pays of $100 or more carry an abandonment rate of just over 20 percent; while with co-pays of $10 or under, the abandonment is only 4 percent."