Prescriptions and Refills

Prescriptions and refills for medications can be requested Monday through Friday during our office hours or at the time of your appointment. It generally takes 24 to 48 hours to process phone requests for refills, so please plan your needs ahead of time accordingly. 

Steroid prescriptions such as Prednisone, Prelone, Orapred and antibiotics require close monitoring and are not typically given without a sick office visit to evaluate the extent of the problem. A physical exam is needed so we diagnose the correct problem. This eliminates guesswork as well as over or under treating a condition.

Insurance companies are constantly changing their formularies (lists of approved medications.) Since there are a wide variety of plans and formularies, we cannot reliably keep up with your individual prescription coverage. We will make every attempt to prescribe something that is both economical and approved by your plan. However, there are times when no generic is available or there is no substitution that is appropriate. Please feel free to discuss your concerns with the Doctor, physician assistant or nurse at the time of your visit.

Please make available any insurance cards that you would give to your pharmacy to process your prescription benefits in case we are required to do a prior authorization. A prior authorization is a written request from our office to your insurance carrier to make an exception and therefore accept payment regarding a particular drug that we prescribe but which is either a third tier drug or not on your formulary. Prior authorizations take considerable time and effort. A list of medications you have tried and failed is required as well as medical reasons for why the current drug is necessary. Patients do not always get granted a formulary exception and approvals can take up to two weeks.

Most of the antihistamines including Allegra (generic is Fexofenadine), Claritin (generic is Loratadine), and Zyrtec (generic is Cetirizine) have gone over the counter and therefore are an out-of-pocket expense for the majority of our patients. Generic forms of each of these sold in pharmacies are widely available and less expensive.