Surescripts ePrescribing Health IT Boosts Drug Price Transparency

Over 500,000 prescribers leverage Surescripts health IT for prescription drug price transparency within their ePrescribing workflows.

The Real-Time Prescription Benefit tool gives providers access to patient-specific prescription drug cost and coverage information at the point of care to make medication decisions with greater price transparency and minimize patient out-of-pocket costs, Surescripts says.

The vendor processed over 300 million real-time prescription benefit checks in the first nine months of 2021 which lead to an estimated $21 million in patient savings.

A recent Surescripts survey revealed two-thirds of prescribers say the cost of prescriptions is one of the top three issues facing healthcare today, and 19 percent of patients report their ability to afford medication has become harder in the past 18 months.

Clinician experts say that with improved prescription drug price transparency at the point of care, prescribers can have more informed conversations with their patients to ensure patients can afford the treatment they need before presenting at the pharmacy counter. After all, medication adherence is a non-starter when the patient can’t even pay for the drug.

"Now more than ever, factoring in both the clinical and financial implications of a medication is essential to medication adherence," Mike Pritts, Chief Product Officer of Surescripts noted in a public statement.

"With Real-Time Prescription Benefit, combined with Electronic Prior Authorization, we’re empowering care providers to seamlessly collaborate with patients on choosing a medication that is both clinically appropriate and affordable while expediting time to therapy,” Pritts noted.

As of October 2021, pharmacy benefit managers and health payers covering more than 97 percent of patients have access to the health IT, a 15 percent increase from December 2020.

Surescripts representatives noted that recent enhancements to the Real-Time Prescription Benefit tool have helped improve the response rate for prescribers. For instance, the tool now delivers price information even when treating uninsured patients and patients whose price information isn’t already available from their benefit plan.

“We know that prescribers want tools to help enable greater visibility into prescription price information,” explained Andrew Mellin, MD, vice president and chief medical information officer of Surescripts. 

“Real-Time Prescription Benefit and Electronic Prior Authorization address so many pain points with improved workflow, easy access to patient information, and more efficient prescribing—all while protecting patient and provider choice,” Mellin said.