Utahns who rely on Medicaid to pay for their prescription drugs may find it more difficult to get a popular medication used to treat Alzheimer’s disease.
On July 1, the state will implement a drug list that gives preference to Namenda and Exelon, two other Alzheimer’s disease medications. The drugs were judged as safe and effective as Aricept, but are less costly.
Tim Morley, Utah Medicaid director, said Medicaid clients who now use Aricept will need to go through an initial authorization process, but “if they have been stabilized on Aricept we are not interested in changing their therapy.”
Morley said the policy change affects 80 clients who took Aricept in the past two months.
“Alzheimer’s patients don’t need to fear about having their medications all of a sudden not becoming available. That is not the case at all,” he said.
Clients who receive new prescriptions for the drug will need prior approval from Medicaid to use it rather than one of the other drugs, Morley said.
The process requires that a doctor submit a form and evidence showing the other drugs were tried but weren’t effective, might result in an adverse drug interaction or that the patient is at risk of an adverse reaction. The authorization is good for one year.
There are currently five drugs approved for use in treatment of Alzheimer’s disease, but several are used infrequently due to side effects. According to the Fisher Center for Alzheimer’s, both Exelon and Aricept are typically used for mild to moderate stages of the disease. Namenda is often used in late stage Alzheimer’s.
A 2008 Kaiser Family Foundation report on Medicare lists Aricept among the 10 most prescribed drugs; using Medicare information, it estimated the median negotiated monthly price of the drug at $158.49.
Morley would not disclose the price the state’s Medicaid program pays for Aricept or the other drugs but said it gets “favorable consideration from manufacturers.”
Most Medicare Part D plans cover Aricept; more than one-third of plans nationwide include it on their preferred drug lists with no restrictions, according to the Kaiser Foundation.
By Brooke Adams
The Salt Lake Tribune
Updated: 06/29/2009 07:29:51
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