£47 for pack of 28 Pepcid Tablets At Vets!!!

moneysaving_pharmacist

Vets are legally obliged to issue you a prescription at no extra cost. It is almost certain that the medication will be cheaper to obtain from a pharmacy than from the vet, although it may take a bit longer for the medication to arrive.

BNF prices only give a rough guide for looking at prices for private prescriptions. For NHS prescriptions we get paid the cost in the drug tariff (http://www.ppa.org.uk/ppa/edt_intro.htm and look at part VIII), plus dispensing fees, practice allowances and establishment fees. The drug tariff price is not always reflective of the wholesale price either. The group I work for generally use a 50% markup on wholesale price, though in some areas this is dropped to 20% markup due to local competition. (We do have to make extra records for private prescriptions). However I do have some discretion and would beat a price from a rival, provided I could still make a profit. Not sure if the pharmacists at boots have that freedom.

As for selling medicines OTC for animals: medicines have product licenses, which lays out what the medicine can be used for, who can use it etc. Just about every OTC product does not have a licence for use in animals. This means that if the pharmacist sells it to you for use in an animal and something goes wrong the pharmacist has increased liabillity. Hence the caution. Of course you could just not say that it was going to be used in animals, but I couldn't possibly advocate that. There are some pharmacies that specialise in animal care, and some animal products are now available from pharmacies (Frontline for example).

mleonard79

Hi Everyone,

Just to update this thread - It was time for my friend to get the next batch of Pepcid tablets last week so we got a prescription off the vets and she's just picked up the tablets from Boots. They charged £6 odd for 15 tablets so that would work out at less than £12 for a whole box as opposed to the £47 the vets charged her a few months ago! She's furious. Anyway just in case anyone else finds themself in the same boat you can get these from Boots with a vets prescription at a much more reasonable price. Thanks again to all those who gave me info and advice on this!

Regards

Michelle