As veterans and VA staff report USPS prescription delays, officials say order early

[Nevilledog]

https://connectingvets.radio.com/articles/veterans-affairs-mail-order-prescription-usps-delays

The vast majority of Department of Veterans Affairs prescriptions are fulfilled by mail. But as U.S. Postal Service delays mount, more and more veterans are reporting long wait times to receive critical medication and VA staff says the problem is only growing.

In fiscal year 2016, VA's mail-order pharmacy processed nearly 120 million outpatient prescriptions and VA provides about 80% of all its outpatient prescriptions to veterans by mail using seven "highly automated pharmacies," according to the department. The other 20% are filled at local VA medical facilities.

VA's mail-order pharmacy system, the Consolidated Mail Outpatient Pharmacy (CMOP), processes nearly half a million prescriptions daily and each working day, more than 330,000 veterans receive a package of prescriptions in the mail. Veterans who live further from VA medical facilities, especially in rural and remote areas of the country, often depend on mail-order prescriptions.

More than two dozen veterans and more than half a dozen VA employees who work in department pharmacies nationwide reported delays for mail-order prescriptions to Connecting Vets. Those veterans and staff spoke on condition of anonymity because they said they feared retaliation from the department or stigma for the medications they use. They provided documents showing medication shipping delays.

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[SheltieLover]

1. *IF* insurance allows

Not all will let you refill early.

[Nevilledog]

2. I'm not sure about how VA scripts work.

But you still have to get your Dr. to change the script and that's a pain to patient and Dr.

[SheltieLover]

3. Me either, re VA

But some people's med insurance requures prescriptions to be filled via mail. My dad's used to be that way.

[mantis49]

4. The problem is, under most insurance,

there is a limit to how early you can order. The pharmacy will not fill if a refill order is too early. This is determined by the insurance.

[crickets]

5. K&R for visibility.

[dalton99a]

6. Louis DeJoy should be arrested.