Cost of Dispensing per Prescription and Break-Even Volume
A pharmacy's cost of dispensing per prescription, from its own costs.
Open the tool → Runs in your browser. Data leaves only if you deliberately send a problem report from the interactive tool.
Example
- Prescriptions dispensed in the period
- 20000
- Pharmacist and staff pay and benefits for dispensing
- 180000 dollars
- Packaging, labels and containers
- 12000 dollars
- Delivery
- 8000 dollars
- Shared rent, utilities, equipment and systems
- 100000 dollars
- Percent of the shared cost allocated to the prescription department
- 60 percent
Result: Cost of dispensing $13.00 a prescription.
The tool opens with these values already filled in. Replace them with your own.
What you enter
- Prescriptions dispensed in the period
- Pharmacist and staff pay and benefits for dispensing
- Counseling, coverage checks and utilization review, if costed apart from staff pay
- Packaging, labels and containers
- Delivery
- Shared rent, utilities, equipment and systems
- Percent of the shared cost allocated to the prescription department
- Average dispensing fee received
The other 5 fields
- Fees by payer, one per line: payer, fee, prescriptions (optional)
- Break-even, fixed costs for the period
- Break-even, average reimbursement per prescription
- Break-even, average ingredient cost per prescription
- Break-even, variable cost per prescription (0 if none)
How this is calculated
Citation
42 CFR 447.502, professional dispensing fee: the pharmacy cost categories (pharmacist time, coverage checks, utilization review, counseling, filling, delivery, special packaging, overhead), excluding ingredient cost. Cost per prescription and break-even volume are arithmetic on the reader's figures. Read the source ↗
A reference and educational tool. Not medical, legal, or financial advice, and not a substitute for clinician judgment.