I've written before about how I cut my drug costs a few months ago from $2K a month to around $1K. I don't have drug coverage, so this is out of pocket for me.

What I hadn't counted in savings was what I was ALREADY saving by pill-splitting. Thanks for reminding me, Katwoman!!!

Pill splitting is NOT taking only half of your dose. It is buying the larger pill and SAVING by cutting it down to the size you need.

One example, Zoloft. I take for my PTSD. If you go to an online site and price out the various forms, you will see how the price ranges:

30 tablets of 25 mg: $77
30 tablets of 50 mg: $75
30 tablets of 100 mg: $76

So, even thought I STARTED at 50 mg dose, getting the 100 mg and splitting them in half saved 50%. Going to 150, my doctor gave me a choice of a script for the 100mg, taking 1 1/2 per day, or 50s, taking 3 per day. Zoloft is a fairly slow uptake with good half life, so getting the dosage exact each time is not so much of an issue. 145 mg vs 150 mgs, my body won't know, and it averages out over time.

So, taking 1.5 of the 100 instead of 6 of the 25 mg is a difference of $110 versus $450!!!

Some pills are much more difficult to split or require an EXACT dose. I still save money by having my doctor write scripts for a combo. (In the above example, using 1 100 mg and 1 50 mg gives exactly 150, but saves between $30 and $300 a month. )

In the pill that I have to use a combo for, since a precise dose IS required, using a combo of 1 100 and 1 25 each day instead of 5 25's (only doses it comes in) saves $700 a month!

This is savings before I even start shopping for best drug prices. At the pharmacy I WAS using prior to comparing prices, the difference on the 125 mg combo was $1500 a month!!!

So yes, splitting pills makes sense. For the manufacturers, the cost of producing the pills doesn't vary much, so the cost that gets passed on doesn't vary that much.

BUT NOTE, you should not split capsules or tablets that crumble. Most pills that can be easily split are scored (line running down the middle to ease in snapping), and tiny pills are most easily split with a thumbnail rather than the huge pill splitter. ALWAYS ask your pharmacist or doctor before splitting pills. They DO understand the cost difference, and WILL advise you well.

So, if I add in the savings from using the best combo of pill sizes with my previous posted savings from price comparison, my monthly savings goes from an original of $5000 a month to the now $1000 a month. Still way too much, but WOW.