Category: Research/Reports

Studies Reach Different Conclusions About Whether Vulnerable Patients Benefit from 340B Savings

July 7, 2023 Tom Mirga Editor at Large Views

Passing 340B drug discounts to patients with COPD so they can buy inhalers at a much lower cost yielded positive outcomes both for the patients and the hospitals that serve them, new research shows.

Two new studies—one by pharmacists at Ascension Via Christi health system in Kansas, the other by drug industry consulting and [...]

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Get PBMs to Squeeze 340B Drugs Harder, “Playbook” Advises Employers

June 27, 2023 Tom Mirga Editor at Large Views

A new "playbook" for business-sponsored health plans advises them to press PBMs to do more to ensure that health care purchasers get the benefits of 340B drug discounts.

A new “playbook” for employers on getting the upper hand with pharmacy benefit managers says PBM handling of 340B drugs is a top 10 concern for business-sponsored health plans.

Released yesterday by the Washington, D.C., based National Alliance of Healthcare

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Hospitals Spend More on Cancer Drugs for Insured Patients After Enrolling in 340B, JAMA Study Finds

June 27, 2023 William Newton Washington Correspondent Views

New research in JAMA says hospitals that joined 340B after its expansion in 2010 treated more commercially insured cancer patients with five commonly used biopharmaceuticals and and spent more on the drugs. Hospital groups criticized the study.

Hospitals that enrolled in the 340B program after its expansion in 2010 treated more commercially insured cancer patients with five commonly prescribed biologic oncology drugs and spent more on the drugs, a new JAMA study found.

The authors of …

RWC-340B Slams Gilead-funded Study of 340B Grantee Entities

June 21, 2023 Tom Mirga Editor at Large Views

“We once thought of Gilead as our partner in the fight to end HIV/AIDS,” RWC-340B President Shannon Burger said about Gilead's sponsorship of a study that questions whether HIV/AIDS clinic patients benefit from the clinics' participation in 340B.

Ryan White Clinics for 340B Access yesterday criticized drug manufacturer Gilead Sciences for sponsoring a study that said it is unclear if patients of Ryan White clinics and other 340B grantee covered entities benefit from the drug margin these entities

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MedPAC Still Backs Cutting 340B Hospitals’ Part B Drug Payments

June 21, 2023 Laura Gilcrest Contributor Views

MedPAC continues to hold that Medicare should pay less for Part B drugs furnished by 340B hospitals.

The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission is sticking by its long-standing recommendation that Medicare should pay less for Part B drugs furnished by 340B hospitals.

“We continue to believe that this approach is appropriate, and the specific level of payment reduction

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JAMA Study Says, When it Comes to Insulin, Pharma’s Gross-to-Net Problem Is Mostly its Own Doing

June 15, 2023 Tom Mirga Editor at Large Views

Insulin product manufacturers' take from sales is diminished more by voluntary commercial discounts than by 340B ceiling prices and other mandatory discounts, a new study found.

Drug manufacturers often observe that a growing share of their take from gross sales goes to middlemen and others in the form of rebates and discounts. A term has been coined to describe the phenomenon: the gross-to-net bubble (the difference

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Nonprofit Hospitals’ Profits Are Up But Charity Care Is Not, Study Finds

June 13, 2023 Laura Gilcrest Contributor Views

"Substantial growth in nonprofit hospital operating profits and cash reserves" yielded no "corresponding increase in charity care," a new study in Health Affairs said. The American Hospital Association strongly criticized the report's methodology and the findings.

Nonprofit hospitals’ profits and cash reserves grew substantially between 2012 and 2019 without a corresponding rise in spending on charity care, a new study in the June issue of Health Affairs found.

The American Hospital Association quickly issued a rebuttal.

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New Studies on 340B and Rural Cancer Care and 340B Contract Pharmacy Demographics

June 8, 2023 Laura Gilcrest Contributor Views

Rural hospitals that enroll in 340B are more likely than others to initiate oncology services, a new study in Health Affairs found.

Rural hospitals that enroll in the 340B drug pricing program are more likely to initiate oncology services than those that do not participate, a study published online Monday in Health Affairs found.

“It’s estimated that around one in five rural

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ASAP 340B and AHA Outreach Documents Are Polar Opposites on 340B DSH Hospitals

June 2, 2023 Tom Mirga Editor at Large Views

A new ASAP 340B document describes how its position on the 340B patient definition would play out under six hypothetical scenarios.

ASAP 340B, the group that drug manufacturers and community health centers formed to advance a joint 340B reform agenda, recently released a two-page explainer on how their plan would change the 340B patient definition. Under it, fewer drugs prescribed at

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340B Providers Don’t Systematically Over-Prescribe Brand Drugs for Profit, JAMA Study Says

May 31, 2023 Laura Gilcrest Contributor Views

Research published in JAMA "found no meaningful difference in overall generic prescribing rates" between 340B and non-340B providers.

340B-eligible providers prescribe generic drugs at the same overall rate as non-340B providers, a study published in JAMA Health Forum found. “We found no evidence that 340B-eligible prescribers were systematically overprescribing brand-name drugs to generate revenue,” the authors said.

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