Who pays for e-prescribing?
Physicians pay software vendors for the e-prescribing software they use. Free e-prescribing software is available from the NEPSI (eRx Now). Increasingly, both CMS and other payers are realizing that physicians will need fi nancial incentives to switch to e-prescribing, as noted above. Private insurance plans are increasingly willing to subsidize the cost of the software used by physicians. Pharmacies that either receive e-prescriptions or send refill requests electronically to physicians must pay a per-prescription transaction fee. This transaction fee paid by the pharmacies is split between the software vendor and the SureScripts network. Dr. Hier is a professor of neurology and rehabilitation at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and the outgoing Physician Editor-in-Chief of MDNG: Neurology Edition.
