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Gives doctors, patients price information at time of prescribing.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has finalized a ruleaimed at making prices more transparent with Medicare Part D drug plans and allowing plan sponsors to use cost-cutting tools such as step therapy under certain circumstances.
“CMS is delivering on price transparency, because patients have a right to know the cost of their healthcare services before they receive them,” CMS Administrator Seema Verma said in a statement Thursday afternoon. “Today’s rule requires Part D plans to adopt tools that provide clinicians with information that they can discuss with patients on out-of-pocket costs for prescription drugs at the time a prescription is written. By empowering patients with information on the cost of their prescription drugs, today’s rule will ensure that pharmaceutical companies have to compete on the basis of price. This effort builds on new requirements for hospitals to disclose chargemaster prices and other agency initiatives to promote price transparency.”
