Not everyone's ready to make the pharmaceutical plan choices required in Medicare Modernization Act, particularly nursing home residents. Less than 13 months to go and ...
Federal and state officials, pharmacists and nursing home directors said they had no idea how these patients would obtain their medicines under the new program, which begins in January 2006.
"The way it's supposed to work under the new law is totally confusing," said Joan E. DaVanzo, vice president of the Lewin Group, which recently received a federal contract to study pharmacy services in nursing homes. "The mandates of the law run contrary to the practice of the industry. The law presumes that Medicare beneficiaries are sophisticated elderly people living in the community and using retail drugstores." In fact, more than one-third of nursing home residents have Alzheimer's disease or another form of dementia, so they cannot easily compare the costs and benefits of different plans. At least one-fifth of nursing home patients have difficulty swallowing. Many receive medications and nutrition through feeding tubes, so they require drugs in a liquid or crushable form.
And best of all ...
"We don't have a clue how the system is supposed to work under the new law," said Laurence F. Lane, vice president of Genesis HealthCare, which operates 192 nursing homes in 12 states. "We don't know what will happen on Jan. 1, 2006."
"If nursing homes have to deal with multiple formularies from multiple prescription drug plans, that will result in chaos and an increased potential for medication errors," said Thomas R. Clark, policy director for the American Society of Consultant Pharmacists, whose 7,000 members specialize in drug care for the elderly.
Reassuring huh?
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