Ever wonder about brand-name versus generic medications? For seniors, who typically use the highest numbers of prescription drugs, it pays to be informed about differences, if any, and the costs.
For every drug that makes it on to the market, there might be hundreds to thousands that were tested previously that didn't make it to your pharmacy's shelf. The process that every brand-name drug goes through takes about seven to 10 years and costs hundreds of millions of dollars. As the length of a patent is 17 years, which is often obtained early in the development process so that no competitor can develop it, the developing pharmaceutical company has limited patent life left to recoup its development costs by the time it reaches the drugstore. As such, brand-name drugs are typically more costly for consumers. The media often selectively reports the cost of one or more brand-name drugs that seem to have excessive or inflated prices. However, if it is only dosed once a year, or a course of the medicine is six doses rather than daily for life, the reasoning behind the high prices for those select drugs appears less opportunistic.
Once the patent life has expired on a drug, other pharmaceutical companies can start to produce copies (or generic versions) of the brand-name drugs, and submit applications to the Food and Drug Administration to market these generic versions. These companies do not have all the development costs of the brand-name companies, as they do not have to repeat all the research that was done to get the original brand-name version of the drug approved and marketed.
The generic versions of the original brand-name drug all have the exact same active ingredient(s) as the brand-name version. However, they are different from the brand-name version in other ways and can be different from other generics as well.
As these differences have nothing to do with the ingredient that provides the clinical benefit, they are generally seen as having no significant impact on the benefit you get. Common differences between all versions may include having different colors or shapes, or have different inactive ingredients that help hold the tablets or capsules together.
Fifteen to 20 years ago when a drug was able to be produced generically, the cost to the consumer went to literally pennies per dose. Nowadays, generic drug manufacturers have realized that they just have to be cheaper than the brand-name version or other generic versions. As such, the price for a prescription of a generic version of a drug may be cheaper than the brand-name but only modestly lower. As more generic drug companies produce their versions of a brand-name drug, the prices drop lower and lower so that they are lower than their competitors and will be chosen by a pharmacy for filling prescriptions. What then about store chains with pharmacies in them that have deals on hundreds of drugs where you only pay a few dollars for a month's course? Remember that these chains can buy as a group and can purchase large quantities and will get cheaper prices on the exact same generic version of a medicine than a private pharmacy would.
Also, many of these stores have grocery, clothing, sports, electronic and other sections in their stores and purposely take losses on their prescription prices in order to draw customers into their stores so that they shop for other things while they wait for their prescriptions.
One of the biggest questions people usually have about generic versions of a medicine is whether it is just as effective as the brand-name version. As the active ingredient in the brand-name and all generic versions of a medicine are exactly the same, most patients find that the majority of generic medicines work just as well as the brand-name drug and are tolerated just as well. The only exceptions are patients who are on select medicines who need to be monitored closely, or that are very sensitive to small adjustments in the dose of their medicine. This is sometimes seen in patients on medicines for epilepsy or thyroid problems, and although it is not important in these patients whether they are started on a generic or brand-name version of the medicine, it is important that they remain on the same version.
Since this is uncommon, patients should always ask their health provider if there is a generic version of a medicine that they can be switched to save some money as well as to stay healthy.
Dr. Guy W. Amsden is director of pharmaceutical care services at Bassett Healthcare.
