step therapy
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Colorado bill seeks to limit step therapy in serious mental illness treatment
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When a doctor prescribes medication for a patient, insurance companies often require the patient to first try a series of alternative, less expensive drugs before they will cover the originally prescribed medication. Critics say that process – called “step therapy” – delays lifesaving care. Rep. Dafna Michaelson Jenet said when she was diagnosed with major depressive…
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Bill mandating rebates to be passed on to consumers clears first House committee
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The bill to change how “step therapy” works – or doesn’t – for thousands of Coloradans with chronic conditions and who are prescribed some of the most expensive drugs took another step toward passage Wednesday. But House Bill 1370 continues to leave out the biggest driver in the cost of prescription drugs – the pharmaceutical industry, acknowledged Rep.…
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Battle heats up over bill on ‘step therapy,’ drug rebates
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Individuals who live with chronic diseases refer to “step therapy” as a major roadblock to getting the often life-saving drugs they need. Health insurance companies view the approach as a way of controlling costs of increasingly more expensive drugs. Both sides collided on Wednesday during debate on House Bill 1370, which seeks to make the…
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O’Hara: Reform flawed “step therapy” to put patients first
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A significant burden to patients – and to health care providers – is the common insurance company practice of overriding a physician’s drug recommendation and requiring a patient to use, and fail on, a lower-cost drug before it will authorize use of the more expensive, physician-preferred, drug. Known as “step therapy” – or more commonly among…
