New CMS Medicaid drug pricing data released with stunning findings

Recently, CMS updated their State Utilization databases, which provides quarterly drug pricing data that shows what state Medicaid programs are spending on prescription drugs. This most recent data update ended up filling in most of the Q2 2018 potholes and extended the 2018 data to include large portions of the third quarter. We have updated all of our dashboards that rely on this dataset, rolling all of them forward to Q3 2018, and there are some insightful takeaways. This update is a really big deal for us at 46brooklyn, because it is the first time that a dataset’s timing will overlap with our existence as an organization. With our launch in August 2018, this meant that CMS’ latest utilization data update for Q3 2018 would be the first real quarter of data that could have been theoretically impacted by our work and Ohio’s work to bring transparency to drug pricing in state Medicaid programs and beyond. After analyzing the data, the results are nothing short of amazing, and a clear indication that this system is in the midst of change. Here’s our insights.

Ben LinkApril 18, 2019Medicaid, Ohio, NADAC, Gleevec, Imatinib, Bloomberg, Kentucky, CVS, Nevada, Georgia, Florida, Texas, Indiana, Missouri, PBM, North Dakota, spread pricing

The Medicaid Markup Galaxies: Discover which drug markups are out of this world

A few months ago, we released our Medicaid Markup Universe that collects all generic drugs dispensed within different state Medicaid programs and displays each as a bubble. The larger the bubble, the greater the cost the state is paying for that drug relative to its acquisition cost (i.e. “markup”). While that dashboard provides a good qualitative feel for individual drug pricing distortions, it doesn’t help quantify the distortions. To better identify those distortions in each Medicaid program, we designed a new visualization that drills down to three different groups (or celestially-speaking, “galaxies”) within the universe. We call them the High-Cost, In-Range, and Low-Cost galaxies. Our newest dashboard, the Medicaid Markup Galaxies, shows which drugs state Medicaid programs may be underpaying for, and perhaps more importantly, which drugs they may be overpaying for.

Ben LinkFebruary 13, 2019NADAC, Markup, Medicaid, Ohio, Massachusetts, GER, Georgia, Washington, Missouri

Examining high drug markups: Introducing the Top 20 over $20

We’re told that drug prices are too high, but who actually is setting the price and where does the money end up going? CMS recently updated their State Utilization databases, which track what state Medicaid programs are being charged for prescription drugs. Most notably, they extended the 2018 data to include the second quarter. We have updated our datasets and visualizations to track the changes in drug markups relative to their actual costs. We’ve studied up and have come up with our “Top 20 over $20” list. In other words, the top 20 drugs dispensed through Medicaid managed care organizations (MCOs) with a markup in of over $20 per prescription. Think of it as a “top 40 under 40” list for generic drugs, with the main difference being that no self-respecting generic drug wants to be on this list. Check out our new visualization that highlights the drugs that are busting the budgets of state Medicaid programs.