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Transparency in Pharmaceutical Purchasing Solutions (TIPPSSM) Certification
While pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) provide valuable services for employers,
many Association members believe that the process by which pharmaceuticals are purchased
on behalf of employees and dependents can be improved. Specifically, they want employers
and their employees to have much more information about the price of pharmaceuticals
and the way in which the pharmacy benefit market operates. Only through greater
transparency can employers and their employees understand the true cost of a drug
and select pharmaceuticals based on the most clinically appropriate and cost effective
medication.
As many employers begin to introduce consumer-driven health care options to their
beneficiaries where patients are supposedly empowered to behave in economically
efficient ways, the current system will not only frustrate but also confuse the
consumer. A major part of that change will be the responsibility of employers and
health care providers to provide information and relevant decision support to enable
this newly empowered health care consumer, in consultation with his or her doctor,
to make informed, cost-effective, quality-based decisions.
HR Policy Association’s Pharmaceutical Coalition developed the TIPPS initiative
to develop a uniform and rigorous set of transparency standards for pharmacy benefit
managers to meet when providing services to Coalition members. The standards are
designed to ensure that the interests of a PBM and its employer clients are aligned.
This simplifies the negotiation process for Coalition members because they can work
with a pre-screened group of PBMs confident that they will provide high transparency
standards. PBMs are certified annually by completing a request for proposal (RFP)
issued by the Association in which a PBM must agree and verify its willingness to
comply with the TIPPS standards. Certified PBMs go through a renewal process annually
to become recertified as standards are updated.
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