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Thursday, April 23, 2020

Impact of Coronavirus on Prescriptions


During the Coronavirus pandemic insurance companies and pharmacy benefit managers have executed many allowances for prescriptions, including relaxation of “Refill too soon” edits, 60-day extension of existing prior authorizations, and allowing retail 90-day prescriptions. This could lead to increased costs.

However, as the entire medical community focuses on the COVID-19 pandemic, volumes of other types of medical visits and prescriptions have dropped dramatically. According to a survey taken by Piper Sandler, a financial services company located in Minneapolis, patient volumes are down 65% and may still be down by about 12% one year from now.

In addition, more than half of all office visits will be via telemedicine through the foreseeable future. Telehealth visits are expected to be as high as 54% of all visits, which is more than a 5-fold increase over pre-COVID-19 numbers. This will help some practices, but is still contributing to a furlough of some medical staffing.

Along with an unprecedented drop in patient volumes, prescription writing dropped by 47% in March, as patients refrain from normal office visits. It is expected to be down by a similar percentage in April. The number of prescriptions for some drugs have declined significantly, while others appear to be holding steady. Total prescriptions for drugs for acute use, such as headaches or heartburn, have plummeted by 28% since February. In contrast, chronic disease therapies, such as those for diabetes or mental health, are doing well, with weekly scripts even growing 2% at the end of March as compared with early February.

Vaccines saw the most decline, most likely because people are concerned about going to doctor offices and pharmacies for vaccinations to address viruses and diseases they do not even have. Other medications that have declined are ophthalmic preparations such as Restasis, and IBS-Constipation medications such as Linzess. Meanwhile, the autoimmune market, HIV and anticoagulants have so far not seen any changes.

Biopharma is not immune to this phenomenon.  The current lockdown is not only hurting clinical trial enrollment, but also delaying regulatory timelines for those drugs that are nearing an approval.  New drug marketing has also been affected because pharmaceutical representatives are unable to call on doctors due to COVID-19 social distancing and quarantine guidelines; for example, the launch of Bristol Myers Squibb's long-awaited Multiple Sclerosis drug, Zeposia, has been postponed.

The coronavirus impact as it relates to the pharmacy benefit is changing by the hour.  The PBIRx team of clinical pharmacists is constantly researching to keep our clients and partners abreast of the newest information so that they can make knowledgeable decisions.





2 comments:

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    so i decided to thank Neme Amber cos she made it possible for me.
    and i can also assure you that he can also help you. so if you need the service of DR emmanuel, ill put his details here so that you can easily get in touch wif him.
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    my Name is Grace from US,once again thanks to Neme Amber. im fucking hapy....  

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