ABSTRACT
One of the more significant changes in the delivery of pharmaceutical benefits over the past decade has been the increasing reliance by public and private third-party payers on pharmaceutical benefit management companies (PBMs). Formed in the early 1980s to help corporations control pharmaceutical benefit expenditures through volume purchasing, PBMs have evolved, expanding their services to include restrictive formulary management, drug utilization review, disease management, and programs to promote physician compliance with formulary guidelines (1). Mailorder prescription dispensing, a more traditional PBM service component, is expanding.
