Financing Your Child's ADHD Treatment

After your child has been diagnosed with ADHD, you may find it difficult to finance his/her treatment. You may experience all or some of the following: doctor's visits, psychiatrist visits, medication, therapy, etc. If your insurance will cover the majority of these costs, count yourself blessed. For many their insurance covers only a small portion if any. How then are you going to finance the treatments that your child so desperately needs? ADDitude Magazine has a wonderful article concentrating on this topic on their website. The article is entitled 7 Strategies To Fund ADD/LD Treatment ~ Expert tips for reducing the financial burden brought on by ADHD. The author the following strategies:

1. Take advantage of a Flexible Spending Arrangement (FSA), if offered by your employer


2. Look into the medical tax deduction


3. File an amended tax return retroactively


4. Spend the time to thoroughly analyze insurance plans


5. Develop friendly relationships with the specialists you consult as well as your insurer


6. Seek out an insurance assistance program


7. Investigate patient assistance programs designed to help the uninsured or underinsured with medication costs
   

To read about each strategy in full detail, visit the ADDitude site.

I would like to add that I have personal experience with strategy #7. My husband recently started a new job and we have to wait the usual 90 days before we will have insurance coverage. I recently visited my local pharmacy and was told my son's Focalin medication would be $180 for a 30 day supply. We can not possibly afford that amount. However, it is crucial that my son have is medication daily. I began to scour the Internet for a solution. I came across a website entitled Partnership for Prescription Assistance. It is simple to use. They require very little information: medication name, age, state, zip, etc. After you input the required information you will be given a list of programs that you may qualify for. I qualified for several but chose yourRXcard.com. I typed in my son's name and the site immediately generated a prescription card for me to print. It even gave me a list of local, participating pharmacies and included how much the medication would cost by using their discount card. I was quite skeptical but printed it anyway. I went straight to my pharmacy, with card in hand, to fill my son's prescription. I was astounded at the result. Instantly, with no cost whatsoever, the medication that was $180 only one hour before, was now $133. Granted that is still a huge amount, but is way better then $180. I saved almost $50 by simply printing out one single sheet of paper.

If you do not currently have a prescription card and your child takes medication, I can highly recommend yourRXcard.com. It's amazing!

Other articles on this topic that may interest you as well:

• ADHD Tax Deductions
• ADHD Medical Insurance