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Are You Paying Too Much for Your Prescriptions?

Regardless of how great your insurance plan is or where you stand on the Affordable Care Act, it’s no secret that prescription drug costs are steadily climbing. Sadly, with the Covid-19 pandemic and the lockdowns that ensued because of it, many people are out of work and unable to afford the higher cost of prescriptions. Even before Covid-19 struck, it was hard for people to pay for their prescriptions because their income wasn’t enough to cover the inflated prices.

In this article, you’ll find a few ways to find affordable prescriptions, from getting a prescription discount card that you can use at your pharmacist to shopping around and asking your pharmacy about discounts and coupons to help cover the cost of medications that you couldn’t otherwise afford.

Apply for a prescription discount card.

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If you’re having problems paying for your medication, you can apply for a prescription discount card through America’s Pharmacy. You don’t even have to leave your home. You can get the card and coupons through America’s Pharmacy app. The card is good at CVS, Walgreens, Walmart, and most other drug stores also. The price of prescription medication is too high, so the coupons and discounts for prescriptions from America’s Pharmacy can help.

Use generic medication instead.

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The FDA has stated that generic medication is basically the same as other prescription medications, except for the price. It is estimated that most generic medicines cost four times less than their name-brand counterparts. Almost 80% of medications have a generic form that you can use. So, if you can get generic, it’s an easy way to save you money. However, you do want to ask your primary care provider if a generic medication is okay to use for your condition, just to be on the safe side. It’s best to find out before you go and get your prescription, and your doctor will happily tell you if you should or not.

Ask for samples from your doctor.

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If the medication you need isn’t available at all in a generic form, and you can’t afford to pay that overinflated price for the brand-name medication, you could ask your doctor for samples. These days, many doctors keep samples in their offices for this very reason. Ask for a 14-day supply of the medicine, and if it indeed does help you, then you can purchase the prescription. If it helps, you really do need it, and maybe the discount card or coupons from America’s Pharmacy will help bring down the price quite a bit for you.

Shop around for lower prices.

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Almost every store out there has a pharmacy in it now. Just because a prescription is super expensive at one store doesn’t mean it will be at another. For example, a prescription you need could be expensive at Walmart but be $30 cheaper at Walgreens and vice versa. It’s best to shop around until you find the price you need if it’s at all possible. Make sure to check out volume discounts as well, since a 90 day supply will cost you less than a 30 day supply in the long run. It’s also possible in many cases to split the prescription in half. This means that you pay for half of the prescription, then when that’s gone, you come back and pay for the other half. It doesn’t make it any cheaper, really, but it does help you get the medicine you need right away and spread out the cost.

These are just a few of the best ways to get your prescription meds at a lower price. So, the answer to the question above is yes, you may be paying too much for your prescription drugs, but there are tools out there that can help.