Amid rising prices for multiple sclerosis medicines, a new study finds that out-of-pocket costs rose substantially in recent years, especially for people with high-deductible plans. And the findings add to growing concerns of the effects of increased spending on patients.
Specifically, multiple sclerosis patients paid $15 a month average out-of-pocket costs in 2004, but that jumped to an average of $309 a month by 2016, a 20-fold increase over a 12-year period. Meanwhile, patients with a high-deductible plan paid an average of $661 per month compared to $246 a month for those not in a high-deductible plan two years ago, according to the study published in Neurology.
Although out-of-pocket costs also increased for other neurologic conditions, multiple sclerosis patients bore a greater burden. For instance, the mean cumulative out-of-pocket costs for multiple sclerosis patients were $2,238, which was 10 times higher than for epilepsy patients, whose costs were $230, over the first two years of diagnosis.
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