Clinicians using an electronic prescribing system appear more likely to prescribe lower-cost medications, reducing drug spending, according to a report in the December 8/22 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
In April 2004, two large Massachusetts insurers began using an electronic prescribing (e-prescribing) system, which provided community-based practices with free wireless devices and access to a secure web portal that color-coded drugs within a three-tier copayment structure. Using 18 months of data, the researchers compared the change in proportion of prescriptions for the three tiers before and after e-prescribing began, and also compared the prescription habits of clinicians using the e-prescribing system to those of control clinicians.
After implementation of e-prescribing, prescriptions for tier 1 pharmaceuticals (preferred drugs with lower copayments, such as generics) increased by 3.3 percent. Second- and third-tier prescriptions for brand-name drugs with higher copayments decreased accordingly among clinicians using the system. Based on average medication costs for private insurers, the researchers estimate that using such an e-prescribing system at this rate could result in savings of $0.70 per patient per month, or $845,000 annually per 100,000 insured patients filling prescriptions.
Read abstract.
