Weird after 11 years or so with Amazing Charts. I had no idea about Dispense As Written as they pertain to codes. In the past couple of years, I have always been under the assumption tha to ensure a pharmacist used the brand name, you had to write Name Brand Medically Necessary. The DAW didn't count. But, there are nine codes all having a different meaning to a pharmacist.
DAW 0 is very weak in that it basically tells the pharmacist he or she can do whatever he or she pleases. DAW is basically the same thing, and in Maine certainly doesn't force the pharmacist to write for the drug on the script. Sometimes DAW 0 will turn into DAW. More later. I used to like DAW, because it fit nicely in the little box when you click on DAW, which gives you DAW in the box, which would make sense since it says DAW. Of couse, you can make it say anything you want in the admin section. I would love to put Name Brand Medically Necessary, but it doesn't fit. Now, there are all sorts of ramifications to this. If the prior authorization is for the generic only, so you want to have the phamacist make it the generic and not just run the brand name through Medicaid's computer and have it turned down. Or worse and a bit ironic, is when they brand name is covered but the generic is not. If you don't put DAW, they are required to use the generic name, which will not go through. So, you should have put in DAW 0 or DAW, but as we have seen, neither do anything so the pharmacist would still likely choose the generic.
But, here is the STRANGE part, and even moreso, since I would have thought that a lot more of my scripts would have been brand name.
Not sure how many people know this but when you use DAW on your script and print it out, it was saw DAW, which is what you would think. But, when you ePrescribe it, the pharmacist sees DAW 1. Don't ask me why. I learned this over a prior authorization question when the pharmacist took the covered hydroxyzine and made it Atarax, and it didn't go through. I am not sure why DAW was even on there, but it came out on the script as DAW 1 when he faxed it back, since I have never heard of DAW 1, I know I didn't write it. But, sure enough it did.
One one script, DAW came out DAW, but on the ePrescribed script, it said, "Name Brand Medically Necessary. We have changed DAW to DAW 1 in AC, so now when we click on DAW, it will go as DAW 1. But, who knows, maybe it will change to DAW 2. DAW 2 is a weird one in that neither the pharmacist nor we have any say over the Brand name, etc. It is up to the patient. But, it still may cost them more or the insurance company may not cover it once they hear the DAW code from the pharmacist. Insurance companies tend not to allow their customers to have any say in the matter.
But, when you Google them, they don't make a lot of sense. But, if you take nothing away from this long post, it should be that at least with 6.1.2, DAW is converted to DAW 1 in cyberspace.
http://tinyurl.com/k33fjwo
