The information herein is irrelevant to you if you have a health care card and get your prescriptions for $5.80 anyway.
It had never occurred to me that it might be worth comparing prices for prescription medications, until a friend alerted me to it. And it is not just a matter of specific brand versus generic medication. I am a typical middle-aged male with a tendency to high blood pressure and cholesterol – hence I am prescribed several drugs on an ongoing basis. I do not have a health care card, so I pay the normal PBS price. Naively I assumed that PBS medications would be the same price everywhere. I would go along to the Chemmart pharmacy in Castlemaine and have my prescriptions filled as necessary. Then I discovered that the Chemist Warehouse chain offer the same medications at much reduced prices. Without disclosing the particular medications I am prescribed (but they are very commonly prescribed), here are some comparisons…
Chemmart Castlemaine Prices:
Item 1: $32.95 (specified brand)
Item 2: $20.45 (specified brand)
Item 3: $35.40 (generic, Pfizer)
Total: $88.80
Chemist Warehouse (Ballarat, Bendigo, Maryborough and other locations):
Item 1: $23.99 (same specified brand)
Item 2: $11.99 (same specified brand)
Item 3: $14.99 (generic, Sandoz)
Total: $50.97
This post is not an advertisement for Chemist Warehouse, so I won’t include a link to their website. There may be other chains, unknown to me, that offer a discount. The retail experience is quite different: Chemist Warehouse is to pharmacy what Bunnings is to hardware. I just want people to know that if they have a need to save some money on their regular medication costs, there is an opportunity to do so. Chemist Warehouse also offer a service whereby you can lodge your prescriptions with them and they will mail your medications to you for $8.95, or free if your order is over $99.00. They also publish their prices online.
