FDA approves generic singulair- yay!!!!!
I heard a clip about Singulair on the NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams. Anytime I hear anything about allergies or asthma, my ears perk up.
This was good news indeed, I've been waiting for Singulair to go generic. With 3 kids taking Singulair year round, the cost really eats into our budget. When the kids first started on Singulair years ago, it was only $28 per month, now I am paying almost $50 a month (times 3!!!!!!!!!!) And then there's all of the other asthma medication they take.....
The story on the NBC Nightly News said that the FDA has approved 10 companies to market a generic form of Singulair. No news on when it will actually hit the market and be available for us to buy at the pharmacy. To read more on the story, click here.
That means I probably will have to ask Asthma Doc to re-write the kid's prescriptions so we can get the generic version. But, we're there once a week anyway getting allergy shots, so that shouldn't be a problem.
For all of you that have kids with multiple allergy and asthma medications, this should help your budget. Now if the co-pay for Advair wasn't so expensive.....
Yay is right! Our insurance bumped this med to tier 2B in February. 2B means that you pay for it all until you meet your deducible which in our case is $5000. So in essence this drug is no longer covered for me. I just had to reorder a 3 month supply and pay $414.00. I tried going without for about 3 weeks to see how that would work out and started getting short of breath and I have very mild asthma (only coughing and wheezing - no attacks). So this generic cannot come soon enough. I'm waiting for Symbicort too, which is supposed to expire it's patent this month too. That one costs me for 3 inhalers $750.00. Good thing I only use it once a day and it last for 2 months. Thanks so much for your blog!
ReplyDeleteI know what you mean! Asthma medications aren't something you can skimp on. You can easily end up in the emergency room or even admitted to the hospital. And that will be a LOT more expensive than paying for the prescription.
ReplyDeleteSon #2 also gets a monthly Xolair injection to control his severe asthma. That costs $1000 a month, luckily insurance covers all but $150 a month. We are able to get co-pay assistance through Needymeds. Check out their website, http://www.needymeds.org/
they save us $1800 a year in copays. Needymeds can coordinate any medication you take with a drug company that will help with copays.
We couldn't afford his Xolair without their help!
Please hurry with the generic Singulair!!!!!!!