By the Numbers: A Closer Look at Why Saving $82 On a Prescription Matters

By now, we’ve all heard the news or experienced for ourselves the record-high price for eggs in the U.S., which was $6.23 a dozen in March, more than double the price of $2.99 at this time last year.

For some families, the weekly grocery budget may not have that kind of wiggle-room. Maybe they decide to substitute oatmeal for breakfast until they see the sticker price on the store shelves come back down.

It’s no omelet but a comparable substitute for the time being.

Unfortunately, many patients are forced to make choices like this—but with greater consequences—when it comes to their medications.

Prescription costs have prevented about one in five adults from filling a prescription, while one in 10 patients have cut pills in half or skipped doses to manage the expense. Unsurprisingly, healthcare professionals rank prescription costs as the top issue they face.

Often, neither the patient nor their prescriber would know the sticker price for the medication they prescribed until they arrived at the pharmacy, ready to check out.

Better Information Can Keep Patient Care on Track

As a physician, this is one of the challenges that healthcare technology must help solve, and it will take collaboration, systemic innovation and advances in health intelligence sharing. But prescribers don’t have to wait until that happens. They can help patients find lower-cost alternative medications today.

“I think that it does enhance the quality and efficiency that we have in choosing prescriptions for our patients and our communication with our patients.”

Greenway Health user Mary Ann Fore

Chief Operating Officer and certified nurse midwife, Clinica Santa Maria

Last year 889,907 prescribers used Real-Time Prescription Benefit technology, saving patients an average of $82 per prescription in 2024 (up from $37 in 2023), according to the 2024 Annual Impact Report. And when prescribers used this tool for high-cost specialty prescriptions, the average savings topped $1,000 for the first time in 2024, at $1,146.

“There are time benefits, there are monetary benefits, but there are also quality of care benefits.”

Dr. Michael Blackman

Chief Medical Officer, Greenway Health

For patients, these savings can mean the difference between accessing needed treatment or risking worse health outcomes.

Purpose-Driven, Impactful Innovation

While we don’t have much say in egg prices week to week, innovation that can save patients from making impossible choices between their health and paying their rent, for example, is the purpose driving this work.

The numbers indicate the impact of how real-time care and cost intelligence can dramatically improve the lives of patients and those who care for them – and is the key to helping healthcare heal itself.

But it also reinforces why we remain committed to innovating for a clear purpose of increasing patient safety, lowering costs, addressing patient access challenges and supporting quality care.