E-prescriptions could save patients money

(HealthDay News) UPDATED 2008-12-08

A new study suggests that an electronic prescribing system that tells doctors which drugs are the least expensive could save patients millions of dollars each year. For the study, investigators looked at 17.4 million prescriptions filled by more than 1.5 million patients of nearly 1,200 Massachusetts physicians. Insurance companies in the study marked their drugs with a simple color-coding system--green for drugs that were preferred, red for drugs that were not preferred. Researchers found that the use of less expensive "tier 1" drugs--such as those available generically--increased by 3.3 percent when e-prescribing was used. Use of more expensive "tier 2" preferred brand-name drugs decreased by 1.9 percent, and use of "tier 3" non-preferred brand-name drugs decreased by 1.5 percent. Read full story >

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