Mail order pharmacies

I didn’t go with completely out-of-pocket for strips, but went ti Livongo, which has essentially the same liberating effect regarding test strips, anyway.

Care to elaborate re: livongo? How does it work?

Sam &/or Others As a protest against the UnAffordable Health Care Act and the HIGHER premium costs I have switched to a Christian Health Share Plan which is much like a Catastrophic Plan. As medications and supplies are not covered can you suggest what Test Strips you find most Out Of Pocket affordable? I’m already cued in on Insulin Savings Cards as well as Walmart’s reasonable Humulin prices as well as benefits of dealing directly with Dexcom. Was hard enough to decide to insert a CGM sensor and I will continue to refuse adding a pump.

A mail order success story here. My mail order does all the work for me, they let me know when an RX is on it’s last refill, it’s time to re-order an RX, and they contact the doc when a new RX is required. All I have to do is receive the medications. I’d rather have a 90 day supply delivered to my door than have to gas up my truck and go get them :slight_smile:

@JJM1

I use and highly recommend Truetest strips. I order them on Amazon— every time I do “I get a thrill up my leg” jokes aside— they’re really good, my insurance covers one touch and I like these so much better that I’ve paid cash for them for years instead— $45 for 300 on Amazon

Check Manny Hernandez, Co-Founder of TuDiabetes and Diabetes Hands Foundation, Joins Livongo HealthTM Leadership Team They have a service that, for a fixed monthly “subscription,” they send a meter plus as many test strips that are needed. The service comes with coaching (if needed), as well. The meter is cellphone-enabled and uploads the data to an online logbook that can be viewed, shared, etc. Been using Livongo since October - so far, been pretty pleased.

How much is the subscription?

They’re not accepting new individual subscriptions, and haven’t been for at least a few months now.

I don’t know what they’re charging now - I signed on with them when they were offering a special start-up rate. I think that program ended, though. I think you’d have to contact them to see what they’re doing now.

so i do have something to ask. what is Express Scripts like ??. it the new Mail order pharmacies.

They have been excellent for all of my diabetical needs, (and other stuffs), and they even have real life pharmacists if you need to speak to someone.

Haven’t heard a peep since I submitted the slip via the Caremark app on Thursday… Other than a confirmation email saying they received my request. How long does the process usually take?

it where i can get my pods from & my Dexcom supplies. but i think i will go with them for everything i need.
thanks for telling me about them.

I didn’t know you could get pods and Dexcom supplies from Express Scripts, erice. Were you talking about Caremark? As for Express - I do get my strips from them, they take some time - likely because of the quantity. The insulin comes next day with no trouble at all. Every now and then a hold up occurs when an RX is needed, I learned to eliminate that trouble and my doc makes sure that no RX expires…ever. Now I’m off to check on pump products, mine are covered under DME not Pharmacy.

both Express & Caremark. & i never got insulin from a mail order. i always get my from the Pharmacy. i have ues Caremark in the pass. but i have never ues Express. sorry for all the questions about it.

IIRC, CareLess says that they will ship your order within 7 business days after receiving your (valid) order. They will have to have a payment method on file (aka credit/debit card) before they will ship, plus they have to have a valid shipping address.

I find it very helpful to check the Caremark.com website to make sure there isn’t a “secure” message that requires some action from me like the card is expired (when I have previously given them a new card), or they want me to acknowledge that I understand the huge amount of the bill for 10 vials of Humalog, when I haven’t met my deductible yet, or some other obscure reason.

Also, if the prescription has been delayed for any reason requiring a call from me to speak with a Customer “Support” Representative, I always, ALWAYS call back within 48 hours to make sure they haven’t dropped the ball.

Once your first script goes through, the subsequent ones should be pretty smooth sailing unless you need to change something. You can also set up auto fulfillment every 90 days. I don’t use that only because I sometimes am traveling and need a different set-up on each shipment.

Thanks yoga…

Mine works slightly different bc it’s actually a self-funded insurance plan that just contracts Caremark rx service, so there aren’t deductibles etc to worry about.

So far I’m not overly impressed. I submitted the script through the cvs Caremark app, which allows you to photograph the script front and back. I received a confirmation email immediately stating they’d received it and it would be processed. 4 days later it still hadnt appeared on the website as an “order” so I called customer service— they said they had no record of any rx submission for my account, and actually went so far as to say they hadn’t even known that scripts could be submitted with the app because this was a brand new feature and they hadn’t been trained on it…

So they suggested that the fastest way to get it processed is to have my doctors office fax it direct to them… Which they did today, and it immediately appeared as an order— then a couple hours later said that more information was needed and that they would contact the prescriber. I can not imagine what additional information could be needed bc the script was perfectly clear, and legible, and the quantity, etc was clearly defined. Time will tell-- first impressions are pretty bad thus far. Supposedly they’re now awaiting info from the doctors office.

Mine works similarly - it’s a self-funded plan that “just” contracts Caremark as the PBM - pharmacy benefits manager. Just remember that you are a beneficiary, not a customer.

In my similar circumstances, I have to nicely beat up the doctor’s staff to get them to write the script with the words that the Caremark pharmacist can understand and agree to fill. Caremark likes to have a precise number of units/day, so they may calculate exactly how many vials to send. BTW, they don’t like 30U/day for some incomprehensible reason. My current endo got frustrated with the pharmacist on the last renewal and wrote “100 U/day”. For some reason the pharmacist (or pharmacist technician) liked that, so now I get 9 or 10 vials when I fill the script. I think that script took almost 3 weeks to get filled. UGH!

Also, I think on that script or maybe the one before, I actually ended up having to have a conference call with the pharmacist and my endo, so that the pharmacist could understand a simple script for Humalog. Double UGH!

Lol… That’s exactly what was on the script-- 30u/day

What a joke… I’m already regretting this.

With all the headaches these folks have given me, I recommend it because the cost is so much lower. Plus, when they threatened to cut me off unless I went mail order, that had an effect as well …

I just now expect the crazy prescription renewal dance every year … and I get it … maybe it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy, but I don’t get much fulfillment from it, LOL!