Patients Rising Now advocates on behalf of patients with life-threatening conditions and chronic diseases for them to have access to vital therapies and services. Access is a matter of survival for those patients, and it spans affordability, insurance coverage, and physical access. To support improved access, we are committed to engaging patients, caregivers, physicians, media, health policy experts, payers, providers, and others to foster realistic, patient-centered, solution-oriented discussions for particular conditions and the entire U.S. health care system. That is, our goal is a balanced dialogue that illuminates the truth about health care in a just and equitable way.
We appreciate the opportunity to provide our comments on ICER’s January 17th Draft Protocol for Unsupported Price Increase Assessments.
The cost of prescription drugs is clearly an important issue. Patients Rising Now believes in evidence-based transparent dialogues about how to balance affordability, access, and promotion of innovation in all areas of health care because all three are key to short and long-term improvements in quality for patients and society. However, we are concerned about ICER’s approach described in its Draft Protocol for several reasons described below.