Buzz Health: Most Employers Plan to Adopt Prescription Savings Solutions

Demand for prescription savings solutions is near-universal among U.S. employers, with 94% of HR, CFO, and benefits leaders saying they were very or extremely likely to adopt a tool that would help educate employees on prescription affordability, according to new research from Buzz Health, a healthcare technology company driving connection across the prescription ecosystem.

The findings take on added urgency alongside a companion consumer survey: two in three American workers (67%) say their employer has never told them about tools or programs that could lower their prescription drug costs. Among employees who made sacrifices due to prescription costs, 55% reported their employer had never informed them about programs that could have helped.

Findings also show that this lack of awareness carries real consequences: 43% of full-time employees reported making at least one health or financial sacrifice in the past year because a prescription was too expensive, including delaying prescription fulfillment, skipping medications, and cutting back on groceries. Notably, employees who paid $35 or more out of pocket for a prescription were significantly more likely to abandon it at the pharmacy counter, a threshold that signals meaningful fill-rate risk for employers.

The findings come from a Buzz Health survey of 1,007 full-time employees and 250 healthcare benefit decision-makers. More than one in four decision-makers (27%) admitted that their company's health plan fails to adequately protect employees from high prescription costs, and 47% said their organization has taken no steps to address prescription affordability. The consequences reach beyond the pharmacy counter. Among employees who made sacrifices due to prescription costs, 55% reported their employer had never informed them about programs that could have helped, and 42% of decision-makers cited prescription affordability as a factor in employee turnover.

"Picture an employee at the pharmacy counter choosing between a needed medication and their groceries, while a savings program that could have helped sits undiscovered in their benefits portal," said Joseph Kleiman, President of Buzz Health. "That moment plays out millions of times a year, and it is entirely preventable. Employers already hold the answer. The most powerful intervention in the entire prescription journey may simply be telling people about the program that already exists."