Innovative payment arrangements reducing costs and improving medicines access

To address rising health care costs and help patients better access new medicines, biopharmaceutical companies are sharing financial risk with payers through new payment arrangements, like value-based contracts or results-based contracts (RBCs), which link reimbursement to patient outcomes.

Research shows these innovative and flexible ways to pay for medicines can lower out-of-pocket costs and enable patients to access the right treatments the first time around. In fact, a new analysis shows results-based contracts may lower patients’ out-of-pocket costs by 28%, noted Katie Koziara, manager of public affairs at trade group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, on the PhRMA website.

According to two new studies published in the Journal of Managed Care & Specialty Pharmacy, shared-risk contracts, like RBCs, can help reduce the costs associated with providing new medicines to patients. The research, which included surveys of payers and biopharmaceutical companies, found: