# Do Dr.'s get Paid for Refilling Prescriptions?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dr-s-get-paid-for-refilling-prescriptions/287370>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [January 30, 2005, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dr-s-get-paid-for-refilling-prescriptions/287370 "2005-01-30T03:25:02Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\
**Post date:** [January 30, 2005, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dr-s-get-paid-for-refilling-prescriptions/287370/1 "2005-01-30T03:25:02Z")

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The title says most of it. I am on a couple of long-term meds prescribed by a specialist. My specialist left the practice so I went and found a new doctor a completely different hospital. He met with me once for about 10 minutes and I explained that my medicines were working fine and I just needed him to refill the presciptions. Every three months, I call and talk to him and he calls in a new set of precriptions. This has been going on for a long time now. Does he get paid for this? Does any doctor get paid for refilling prescriptions?

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**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\
**Post date:** [January 30, 2005, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dr-s-get-paid-for-refilling-prescriptions/287370/2 "2005-01-30T04:11:07Z")

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It’d be quite uncommon for a doc to get paid for refilling prescriptions. Usually a doc gets paid only for a visit with the patient. Some doctors are beginning to charge patients for phone consultations. But I know of no physicians who get paid just for writing refills.

A good doc will insist on physically seeing you periodically for any chronic condition which requires continuing medication. But that’s different from getting paid for doing refills.

QtM, MD

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**Author:** ![SandyHook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dec6dc/32.png) [@SandyHook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SandyHook)\
**Post date:** [January 30, 2005, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-dr-s-get-paid-for-refilling-prescriptions/287370/3 "2005-01-30T08:14:09Z")

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I just finished reading “Middlemarch” by George Eliot. This was in 1830ish England. One of the characters was a doctor who was having problems establishing a practise because he didn’t give out medicines but wrote perscriptions which they had to then go elsewhere and get filled. He considered it unethical to sell medicine because, as I remember the story, it put the doctor in the position of profiting from a long illness with lots of refills. Evidently at this time and place the idea of paying a doctor for what he knew was unheard of. What the people expected to pay for was the medicine/cure.  
Just thought I’d pass that along.