Posted by Michael Wonder on 04 Aug 2016
CVS Health to replace higher-cost drugs on covered medication list for 2017
2 August 2016 - CVS Health, the giant pharmacy benefits manager, moved Tuesday to counteract the financial impact of high-cost medications by excluding a number of drugs used to treat patients with cancer, diabetes and hepatitis C.
"We expect to remove 35 products from our standard formulary" — a list of covered products — "including 10 hyperinflationary drugs," said CVS Health, which provides prescription benefit management services to several thousands health plans.
In some cases, higher-cost drugs are being replaced with lower-cost options, the company said.
CVS Health also said that it will, on a quarterly basis, evaluate medications "with egregious cost inflation" that have available, clinically appropriate and more cost-effective alternatives, and possibly remove the more expensive drugs from its standard formulary.
