price transparency since Affordable Care Act It came into effect more than 10 years ago.After an industry-wide review and comment period, new rulings such as 21st Century Healing Expanded exchange of electronic health information.At the same time, innovation and investment in new technologies that support price transparency have skyrocketed, while continuing efforts to drive down drug prices for consumers, such as the recently passed Inflation Reduction Actempowering Medicare to address rising drug prices and premiums.
Recently, the author of the article published in Medical City News, The question was raised as to whether the Real Time Benefit Tool (RTBT) derived from the Cure Act could help save patients money. The answer is that access to price information provided by RTBT at the point of care is critical to improving the quality and affordability of care. But with so many choices for patients, providers and payers, trust in the information provided has never been more important.
As we enter the third year of the Covid-19 pandemic, we must acknowledge how much the lives and needs of patients and those caring for them have changed. There is no doubt that concerns about prescription costs are a growing challenge. In June 2021, 19% of patients said it had become more difficult to buy medicines, while 82% of pharmacists and 66% of prescribers said prescription costs were one of the biggest concerns in healthcare. At the same time, the resources of hospitals, doctors’ offices and pharmacies across the country are already stretched thin.
U.S. healthcare professionals and organizations are responding to all these changes by addressing medication affordability and adherence up front. Taking RTBT can lead to no. These savings add up to the fact that most Americans fill more than 10 prescriptions per year. We can expect RTBT adoption to continue to grow and expand, enabling more providers to get prescription drug cost and coverage information for patients at the point of care without cumbersome phone calls and faxes. In turn, giving more patients timely access to the medicines they need at prices they can afford.
Pharmacists and prescribers are well acquainted with the relationship between the out-of-pocket cost of a prescription and a patient’s ability to adhere to treatment, so it’s no surprise that they embrace this new technology. But we also have to admit that the adoption of new technologies across the healthcare industry may sometimes be slower than some of us would like. Given that it has taken so many prescribers nearly 10 years to use e-prescribing, it’s remarkable to see how quickly providers are embracing this new technology. However, the market for price transparency tools has expanded considerably over the past 10 years with new innovations and investments.
RTBT plays an important role in getting patients to take their medication. According to a recent study, when a patient’s copay is increased by $10, the likelihood of giving up a prescription increases by 10%. While not all RTBTs provide pricing information directly from a patient’s benefit plan, those do enable prescribers and pharmacists to consider clinically appropriate and affordable treatment alternatives. And, when this information is integrated into a clinician’s workflow, it can provide clinicians with this important cost-saving information at the point of care, ultimately reducing the chance of drug abandonment. In addition to benefit-based solutions, there are countless other ways to support prescribing decisions, including manufacturer coupons, pharmacy savings programs, consumer apps that support pharmacy shopping, and vendor apps that support side-by-side comparisons of benefit-based prices Program and Cash Price.
The survey also shows that consumers want more access to price information, and healthcare transparency companies have had significant venture capital funding to support that demand over the past few years.
However, according to recent research, many patients still turn to the advice of their care providers, whom they trust more than any other specialty. As a result, providers often seek out health care pricing information themselves. In a recent survey of physicians, 56 percent said getting out-of-pocket expenses was a top priority. But providers value cost transparency in all aspects of the healthcare journey, with 75% placing the highest priority on drug prescription data, 74% saying it’s important to consider a patient’s medical benefit information, and 59% saying they want to be able to compare the number of drugs that cost alike, and 44% value access to coupons, patient assistance programs, or other sources of prescription cost information.
As patients increasingly seek care from different providers in different locations, it is more important than ever for healthcare professionals to have patient intelligence in the right place at the right time so they can access The trusted insights needed to best serve patients. Giving providers a better understanding of patients’ out-of-pocket prescriptions is just RTBT helping providers and patients make informed care decisions that reduce medication costs and improve adherence. This is how we think healthcare should be provided.
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