Drug abuse

... ABC 7 News - Medicare Patients Find Drug Restrictions wjla.com web by News The District Virginia Maryland On Your Side Consumer Medical Reports National Bloomberg Business International Politics Sci-Tech Entertainment Today In History Weird News ABC 7 Team eNews Alerts Weather Sports ABC 7 eVideo WeatherBug Network NewsLinks ABC 7 I-Team Inside Washington Capital Sunday Medical Reports Talent Bios My Profile Community Events Programming ABC 7 Classifieds Games Daily Horoscope Employment Lottery Results Home Page Medicare Patients Find Drug Restrictions Thursday March 30, 2006 8:54am Washington (AP) - Thousands of elderly patients are learning the hard way that it isn't enough to check whether their medicines are covered under a new Medicare drug plan they have chosen.

Insurers are using a broad range of tools to get customers to take the cheaper drugs they want them to take, and failure to follow their instructions can be costly.

In many cases, a patient's doctor has to get prior approval for a drug before the plan will cover it.

In others, the plan will limit the quantity of a drug the patient can get.

Plans also divide drugs into tiers.

The lowest level requires only nominal out-of-pocket costs, while the highest - called specialty tiers - require the customer to pay for a...

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