Consumer / Employer, Payers, Pharmacy

Amazon Pharmacy launches prescription discount savings card for Blue Plan members in 5 states

The discount card, administered by InsideRx, is offered through Prime Therapeutics and its Blue Cross and Blue Shield clients. To use MedsYourWay, customers must get their drugs from Amazon Pharmacy.

Amazon’s pharmacy arm has launched a new prescription discount savings card that aims to make it easier for insured customers to save on drugs. The card, called MedsYourWay, is now available to Blue Plan members in five states.

At present, people with insurance who want to save money on a prescription frequently face a tough choice: use their health plan and just pay the copay or access a potentially cheaper cash price through a discount card or savings program. While the cash option sometimes costs less upfront, the money spent typically isn’t applied to a plan’s deductible or out-of-pocket maximum.

“Oftentimes discount cards act as an alternative rather than a complement to your current benefits package,” explained Dr. Nworah Ayogu, chief medical officer for Amazon Pharmacy, in an interview at the ViVE conference in Miami Beach.

But that’s not the case with Amazon Pharmacy’s MedsYourWay, which is administered by Inside Rx, the company that also operates Amazon Prime’s prescription savings benefit. (That program, Amazon Prime Rx, and the affiliated discount savings card, can be used by people without insurance or outside an insurance plan.)

MedsYourWay is offered through pharmacy benefit manager Prime Therapeutics and its Blue Cross and Blue Shield plan clients. That includes Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Nebraska, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Alabama, Florida Blue and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas.

“With MedsYourWay, all of those payments will now apply to their out-of-pocket maximums and to their deductibles,” Ayogu said.

However, it can’t be used at just any pharmacy. To use MedsYourWay, customers must be getting their drugs from Amazon Pharmacy.

As an alternative, Amazon Prime Rx offers savings and discounts on prescriptions at more than 60,000 pharmacies including Amazon Pharmacy. But, as is the case typically with other discount cards and programs, the money spent on lower cost medications may not be counted toward a person’s health plan deductible or out-of-pocket maximum.

By providing convenient access to prescriptions, decreasing cost and increasing pricing transparency and offering 24/7 access to a pharmacist by phone for customers, Amazon Pharmacy is working to make it easier for patients to ultimately get the medications they need, Ayogu said.

Eligible Blue Plan members who select Amazon as their pharmacy will have a simplified sign-up experience and real-time, plan-specific pricing on prescription medications, according to the company. Amazon Pharmacy also offers free home delivery and free two-day shipping for Amazon Prime members.

Data shows 20% to 30% of prescriptions are never filled, which can have serious health consequences. In the U.S., a lack of medication adherence is estimated to cause approximately 125,000 deaths and at least 10% of hospitalizations, and cost the U.S. health care system between $100 billion and $289 billion annually, according to a research review published in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

However, correcting the problem isn’t as simple as asking patients to fill their prescriptions.

There are so many barriers to adherence,” Ayogu said. 

Amazon Pharmacy is seeking to reduce the cost of medications and make it more convenient to access prescribed drugs, among other efforts, to help remove those barriers, he said. The company is also hoping to expand its MedsYourWay program and offer it through other insurance plans in the future.

We’re eager to partner with all plans that want to move forward with customer-obsessed innovations,” Ayogu said.

Photo credit; hillwoman2. Getty Images

Editor’s Note: An earlier version of the story didn’t note that MedCity News is a partner of HLTH, the organizer of ViVE. 

Shares0
Shares0