[Dailydrool] Prescription costs

[Pamela McQuade via Dailydrool]

I discovered that prescription prices can vary greatly, depending on 
what pharmacy you buy them from. I am on a gazillion drugs myself, and I 
have seen it with my drugs. The privately owned pharmacy I go to is 
cheaper than the online one my insurance company keeps trying to sell me 
on. The only way to know what is cheapest is to call around.

Watch out for food-store pharmacies. One of them advertised a drug one 
of my dogs was on at a very cheap price. When I went to pick up the 
medication, it turned out it was way more expensive than my usual 
pharmacy. But to do them justice, Abner was on a different medication 
that they gave us for free. It happened to be a common one (perhaps his 
thyroid medication?) that was a lure to get people to use their 
pharmacy. I  had thought the expensive drug was another of those, but 
the left hand did not seem to know what the right one was doing. No one 
could explain the high price to me.

One of the drawbacks of mailing pharmacies is that many drugs have 
warnings that they should not be allowed to sit at high or low 
temperatures. You cannot guarantee that the UPS guy or whoever else 
delivers for them will not allow your precious drugs to sit all day in 
the heat or cold.

As I have said before, one of the most expensive ways to deal with 
canine glaucoma is to buy drugs from the eye doc. I found we could get 
Dex's drugs way cheaper by getting the script and having it filled with 
a generic at a pharmacy. In NJ, and probably elsewhere, vets are 
required to give a script if you ask for one.

Hope this helps.

Pam, food slave to the Dashing Bassets