Joined
·
12 Posts
New member here. Hi. I've had anxiety issues since high school. Diarrhea started around then as an anxiety symptom. Soon became IBS-D, i.e. even without feeling anxious, I would have diarrhea after most tasty meals. After a while this made me pretty nervous. And so the cycle perpetuated itself.This went on for the better part of my high school, college, and career-oriented years. Formative years.Late last year I got a prescription for Librax, and I was untethered from every restroom after the first dose. Nothing had ever worked this well. I had tried fiber supplements, carrying Immodium with me everywhere (usually only helped after the first attack), and Levsin. The latter drug seemed to dull the pain, but did not stop the diarrhea. But that was a while ago. Now I'm taking Librax and everything is fine and I'm happier than I've ever been in my whole life.My initial prescription was ready to be refilled, but when I got to the pharmacy they said it would be $165 for a 24-day supply. The supplier for this Rx, Excellium Pharma, was inexplicably not covered by my insurance despite being exactly the same chemical composition as the one that was covered, provided by Breckenridge (I did my homework, as you can tell). They luckily had a supply of the covered version left over that could last me until February, maybe longer if I scaled back the dose. They put this supply aside and wrote my name on the caps.So the other day I call in my next refill, and they charge me $165 again. I asked if they had obtained the pills from the reserved supply, and it turns out they did; Blue Cross simply no longer covers it as of the new year. Two points that need to be made:1. As an insurance company, Blue Cross is an utter failure to me. They did not notify me of their change in preferred supplier, nor did they notify me that they would be removing coverage of this drug altogether. If I did not have a week's supply left, I would have been stuck with no medication, cut off abruptly, leading in all likelihood to major withdrawal side effects from the Librium component. This is a serious defect in communication.2. Librax is a combo drug, containing a benzodiazepine for anxiety and an anti-cholinergic for slowing the intestines and backing off the acid secretions. The former component is available on its own, but the anti-cholinergic of choice in Librax, Clidinium, does not seem to be available anywhere. And if it were, Blue Cross probably wouldn't cover it.What do I do now? I know nothing about the differences between anti-cholinergics. There's Clidinium, Hyoscyamine, Atropine, the list goes on. Do I just pick one and hope for the best? Does anybody know of a way I can buy large quantities of Librax for cheaper than $165 per month?Sorry for the long initial post. It's been an ongoing saga, and this seemed like the place to vent my frustrations and seek guidance. Thank you.-Ryan