Cost-Cutting on Drugs Has Health Cost

[CShine]

Middle-aged and elderly Americans who cut back on prescription drugs for chronic illnesses because of the expense do so at the expense of their health.New research shows, for the first time, that people with preexisting chronic medical conditions who curtailed their prescription medications because of cost were 76 percent more likely to then suffer a significant decline in their overall health and 50 percent more likely to have a nonfatal heart attack, stroke or chest pain episode than those who did not cut back. The findings are published in the July issue of the American Public Health Association's journal Medical Care.

"The study is consistent with a large body of literature that demonstrates the health consequences and the financial barriers to necessary drugs, and I think we can really hope there will be an impact because there's so much we can do," said Dr. Arlene S. Bierman, the author of an accompanying editorial in the journal, who was previously a research physician at the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality in Rockville, Md.

Both the use and the cost of prescription drugs have been rising rapidly in the United States. Annual aggregate expenditures increased to $162 billion in 2002, up from $51 billion in 1993, according to Bierman's editorial.



http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=97&ncid=751&e=10&u=/hsn/20040625/hl_hsn/costcuttingondrugshashealthcost

[shraby]

1. Duh! No shit Sherlock. n/t