Copyright 1999 Daily News, L.P.
Daily News (New
York)
April 11, 1999, Sunday
SECTION: Lifeline; Pg. 16
LENGTH: 1278 words
HEADLINE:
PHARMACY FUTURES
OUR ONLINE DRUGSTORE TEST-DRIVE FOUND THEM VIRTUALLY
USELESS - FOR NOW
BYLINE: BY SUSAN FERRARO
BODY:
Internet pharmacies
- the click!-and-deliver drugstore equivalent of the wildly successful online
bookstore business - are an idea whose time has come.
The only drawback?
They aren't quite 100% reliable - yet.
For Traver Hutchins, a Manhattan
businessman, trying to order prescription drugs online has been, well -
difficult. And, he discovered when he finally succeeded, darn expensive.
On a recent Friday, Hutchins tried ordering from two of the three online
pharmacies that have burst onto the Internet
since the beginning of the year. Both were slow. One rejected the password he
chose, the other had a lengthy registration process that ate up time. After a
frustrating, fruitless hour, he quit. Glitches aside, virtual pharmacies are
probably the drugstores of the future. Soma.com launched into cyberspace in
January, drugstore.com in February, planetrx.com in March. Chains like RiteAid
are fielding their own. And a big PBM - pharmacy benefit manager, linking HMOs
and regular drugstores - is launching YourPharmacy.com in June.
They
will be made to work, because the profits are so great. Americans spend $ 102
billion a year on prescriptions, five times the book market, which exploded for
online booksellers. Over-the-counter items boost sales to $ 230 billion, a
figure that will approach $ 300 billion by 2003.
But consumers should
know that Internet full-service pharmacies - outfits that sell prescription
drugs and over-the-counter items - are an emerging technology. Buying drugs
online is more complicated - and more personal - than buying books.
The
potential convenience is great: Internet drugstores are national and save all
that park-and-shop time. E-mailed refill reminders will help assure compliance
for busy executives, mothers and senior citizens who postpone or forget.
They also promise 24-hour access, by E-mail or telephone - more contact,
their spokespeople say, with real pharmacists than is provided by most chain
drugstores, where people wait in long, public lines to pour out intimate medical
questions to a pharmaceutical
assistant.
David Malpass, an
economist at Bear Stearns, used drugstore.com to buy over-the-counter items.
"What I liked was that I didn't have to stand in the checkout line, which seems
like a constant aggravation," he says.
"You could find the products more
easily, too. If all you want is razor blades, for example, you just put in the
product, and you don't have to wander up and down the aisles looking for it, or
the special brand that you want. I bought quite a bit of stuff and it came right
away."
Pros & cons
Even when they are up and running
flawlessly, Internet pharmacies won't be able to provide meds for acute
illnesses - antibiotics for a child's raging sinus infection, or elastic
bandages needed right now for a sprain. Some people doubt that E-mail will
provide truly personalized service. "I don't think it's good for the health of
the public," says Jim Schiffer of the Family Pharmacy in Brooklyn and head of
the New York City Pharmacists Society.
"To just type into the computer
isn't always going to pick up what we [get] in a one-to-one conversation with
patients. We notice a hesitation, a concern, a fear." Safety is in the details,
Schiffer suggests. For example, "people who take vitamin E have to stay away
from blood thinners because it can act as a blood thinner."
(The Food
and Drug Administration has asked the Federal Trade Commission to help monitor
Web sites that dispense drugs illegally, and several congressmen have called for
government agencies to assess the Internet drug market.)
Meanwhile,
there are those glitches.
Because online drugstores are such a good idea
- so hot! so new! - Hutchins tried again. "It's the convenience," says the
businessman, who travels a lot and might want to order a refill when he's away.
"If you know what you want, just click on it and get it shipped to you."
This time Hutchins tried soma.com, where he had successfully ordered
over-the-counter products a few weeks before. At first, things improved. He
registered, gave his insurance numbers and found that he could "easily navigate
to get my Prilosec, a common heartburn medication." Soma.com called his doctor
to confirm the script. The medicine arrived on his doorstep the next Tuesday.
The problem? "I got billed at the full amount!" says Hutchins, who
expected to be charged a $ 10 co-pay because he had provided his insurance
numbers. The total charged to his bill: $ 76.99. "Apparently, there is no way to
know who they have a plan with, and who they don't. They should tell you up
front," Hutchins grumbled.
Later, soma.com spokesman Mitchell Reed
promised to "make good" Hutchins' cost. "Usually we will confirm the insurance
carriers," Reed says. He doesn't know why they didn't for Hutchins. "About 70%
of all Americans with insurance can access our system and get coverage, just pay
their co-pay," Reed says.
And Hutchins wasn't the only one. Brooklyn
resident Maryann Parthum, 37, reached drugstore.com but found that her insurance
did not cover its services. Soma.com was frozen when she tried to access it but
offered to take her order by phone. "I decided not to," she says. "It was
supposed to work as a Web site."
And when Shazia Ahmad, 26, a graduate
student at Columbia University, tried planetrx.com, she, too, was foiled.
Signing on was complicated but took only five minutes, she says. Sorting through
the forms to get a prescription for Claritin, an antihistamine, took 15 more.
And then the screen flashed "HTTP/1.1 Server Too Busy."
Maybe next time.
IF YOU AREN'T ONLINE
Most Internet shoppers log on at home or
the office. Yet some bosses frown on employees using office machines for
personal business.
If you don't have Internet access, inquire at your
local library, which may offer free Internet access. Office-support businesses
like Kinko's provide Web access for a fee - 20 cents a minute, or $ 12 an hour.
Sidebar:
internet 411
Logged on to an Internet health
site lately? Join the crowd. About 60 million Americans have searched a health
Web site, says a recent Harris poll. There are 15,000 "quality" health sites -
from niche sites for specific diseases to "portal" sites that provide general
information.
Patients log on to prepare for doctor visits. About 1 in 4
Web surfers researching a given disease joins an online support group, according
to the Intel technology company. Doctors use the Internet, too, as a resource
and to E-mail patients.
To find the best sites, look for a support group
and ask questions, says Dr. Tom Ferguson, author of "Health Online." Beware of
sites that "ask for a credit card or check. A lot of places make unrealistic
claims and try to sell you something, and that's about the biggest hazard."
Generally, Internet addresses ending in .org are nonprofits
(www.natlbcc.org, for the National Breast Cancer Coalition); .gov is a
government site (www.nih.gov, National Institutes of Health) and .edu signals a
college or university.
Some good starting places:
H
www.ama.assn.org/consumer.htm from the American Medical Association with links
to other health sites
H www.betterhealth.com with clear definitions,
links to reliable sources and risk assessment
H www.intelihealth.com
from Johns Hopkins University Health System with Aetna U.S. Healthcare.
QuickGuide
Adult-Onset Diabetes Life Plan
Notes: Graphic
not available electronically
Source: Based on "The Diabetes Cure: A
Medical Approach That Can Slow, Stop, Even Cure Type 2 Diabetes" by Vern
Cherewatenko, M.D., and Paul Perry (Clifford Street Books, $ 25
GRAPHIC: Simone Tieber Illustration BUD
WILLIAMS DAILY NEWS FLOP PlantRx. was too busy to fill Shazia Ahmad's order.
LOAD-DATE: April 13, 1999 
