US e-Rx networks unite to help adoption

Two major US electronic prescription networks have announced their merger, in an attempt to make it easier and more attractive for pharmacists and physicians to adopt the technology. SureScripts, which is owned by pharmacist groups the National Association of Chain Drug Stores and the National Community Pharmacists Association, will join forces with RxHub National Patient Health Information Network, a joint venture of the three largest US pharmacy benefit managers - CVS Caremark, Express Scripts and Medco Health Solutions.

Both networks were founded in 2001 and represent complementary approaches to the issue of e-prescribing. RxHub's value is in the 200 million insured patients who are registered on its database, whereas SureScripts offers a drugstore routing system. Together, the new SureScripts-RxHub facility expects to handle over 100 million e-prescriptions in 2008, as well as 70 million physician enquiries about patients' medication history and insurance coverage for particular treatments. Neither physicians nor pharmacists are charged according to the number of prescriptions submitted, an incentive for subscribers to make full use of the facility.