Employers Try Cutting Diabetes Drug Copays
Soon after those results were published, the APhA Foundation, with financial backing from GlaxoSmithKline, created an initiative patterned after the Asheville Project. Thirty employers in 10 cities are now participating in the Diabetes Ten City Challenge. The employers include municipal and county governments, utilities, supermarket chains, schools, health care systems, universities, and corporations in Charleston and Spartanburg, S.C.; Chicago; Colorado Springs; Cumberland, Md.; Dalton, Ga.; Honolulu; Los Angeles; Milwaukee; Pittsburgh; and Tampa Bay, Fla.
More than 1,100 diabetics are participating among the 30 employers, Bill Ellis, executive director and CEO of the APhA Foundation, said in an interview.
The majority—70%–-are white; 19% are African American and 40% are aged 50–59 years. About a quarter are aged over 60 years, and 22% are aged 40–49.
It is a voluntary program, but once in, patients have to agree to meet with an assigned pharmacist—about 4–7 times yearly—for education and training, and to show they are working toward certain goals such as getting annual eye and foot exams. The pharmacists set the goals, but patients are prompted to consult regularly with their physicians, said Mr. Ellis.
In return, the cost of diabetes medication is reduced or eliminated, depending on the employer's benefit design, he said. On average, patients save $400 a year, said Mr. Ellis. Employers foot the bill for the pharmacists' fees and the copays. In some cases, they may also cover medications that have been found to be effective in managing diabetes complications, he said.
The employer participants and the APhA Foundation are tracking clinical and economic outcomes and will eventually report those, along with patient satisfaction scores.
Although employers are in many cases contributing a significant amount of money up front, they are willing to, said Mr. Ellis. “They're making an investment in keeping people well,” he said.
Nancy Kennedy, executive director of the Dalton, Ga.-based Northwest Georgia Healthcare Partnership, said in an interview that her member companies were interested in the diabetes program because a majority of their health care dollars go to that disease. Half of the jobs in Dalton are in manufacturing (mostly carpets) and surrounding Whitfield County has a large Hispanic population. Hispanics have a 1.5 times higher prevalence of diabetes than do whites, which makes the condition a major concern for the northwest Georgia companies.
