Pharmacy benefits

As technology and health care become more intertwined, a visit to the doctor can be as easy as a touch of an app. UnitedHealthcare Thursday announced an expansion of telehealth coverage options for virtual physician visits.

Prescription drug prices continue to rise in 2015, compelling employers and their advisers to take action through innovative plan designs.

Generic pharmaceuticals have maintained their “laggard” status compared to branded and specialty drugs with respect to rising prices.

UnitedHealth Group’s $12.8 billion purchase of pharmacy benefit manager Catamaran Corp. continues a trend of PBM acquisitions, and there’s more to come, industry consultants say. In the long term, that may mean lower costs and more data availability for employers.

UnitedHealth Group Inc. agreed to buy Catamaran Corp. for about $12.8 billion, bulking up its drug-benefits business to get better negotiating power in talks with pharmaceutical companies over prices.

Novartis’ Zarxio is the first biosimilar product approved in the United States, ushering in a new era for the drug industry, consumers and third parties who manage medical and drug benefits.

The majority of employers spent 16% or more of their total health care budgets on pharmacy benefits last year, up from 71% in 2013.

Specialty drugs are costly for plan sponsors and employees. Can value-based insurance design deliver better cost and clinical outcomes?

How high-cost specialty drugs are altering the duties of the benefit adviser and pharmacy benefit manager

Eight years after drugstore chain giant CVS bought PBM Caremark, Rite Aid followed suit yesterday in announcing plans to acquire EnvisionRx, a 14-year-old PBM with estimated 2015 revenue of $5 billion, and 21 million covered lives.

Would saving an extra $200 billion in health care costs a year sound nice? No, it’s not another ploy to get rid of the ACA … for once. Annually, between $100 billion and $289 billion is spent on hospital visits due to patients failing to adhere to their prescription medicines

Potential fixes to Affordable Care Act exchange enrollment and tweaks to the law itself are recommended by industry insiders at Washington panel.

From the launch of the exchanges to the outbreak of Ebola, 2014 brought a number of landmark events that remind us why it is such a fascinating time to work in health care.

Commentary: Why employers need benefit advisers more than ever to fight rising generic drug prices.

U.S. policymakers have implemented major changes to the health insurance industry with the goal of improving the experiences and outcomes of patients. Yet there are still many health care consumers who express deep dissatisfaction with their plans

Commentary: Why understanding the impact of health plan costs, employer contribution and employee demographics is vital to sponsoring benefits in 2015.

Commentary: Why understanding the impact of health plan costs, employer contribution and employee demographics is vital to sponsoring benefits in 2015.

Comparing prescription drug benefits offered on the Covered California state-run exchange is expected to be easier during the 2015 open enrollment.

While pharmacy benefits utilization was roughly the same during the first half of 2014 for individuals enrolled in public health insurance exchanges and traditional insurance market plans, a new analysis shows the utilization of specialty drugs is much higher in the HIX marketplace.

Employing a proactive strategy to address the explosive costs of specialty medications can serve the patients who need those specialized meds, with an unbelievable 63% increase in costs expected in the next two years.