"An easy remedy: Cut your drug bills in half by cutting pills in half."Pill splitting is a deceptively simple way to save money on drugs, but few consumers or even doctors are aware that it's an option. A quirk in the way drugs are manufactured and priced means many drugs cost about the same per pill, regardless of the dosage. As a result, patients who buy a larger pill that contains twice the dose they need can cut it in half and save as much as 50 percent. For example, Merck's cholesterol-lowering drug Zocor costs about $3.94 a pill, whether the dose is for 20 milligrams or 40 milligrams, according to DestinationRX.com, which compares retail and Internet drugstore prices. A patient who needs a 20-milligram daily dose can cut a 40-milligram pill in half, dropping the cost to just $1.97, saving more than $700 annually. A patient who needs a 75-milligram daily dose of Pfizer's antidepressant Zoloft would pay $6.66 to take three 25-milligram pills. But splitting a combination of 100-milligram and 50-milligram pills to achieve a 75-milligram dose lowers the cost to just $2.53, a savings of 62 percent — or more than $1,500 annually. Given that many older, uninsured patients have several prescriptions, the annual savings from pill splitting can add up to thousands of dollars. Detroit cardiologist Joseph Rogers regularly counsels patients to split pills, and dispenses the same advice through Rxaminer.com, a Web site offering customized reports telling patients how to lower drug costs. "In the United States, about $800 million worth of Viagra was sold last year," says Dr. Rogers. "If everybody split their pill, that would save $400 million. That's not going to solve the whole problem of drug pricing, but it's a nice first step." To read the complete original article, please click on the link below:
"An easy remedy: Cut your drug bills in half |