Ordering Prescription Drugs

Your pharmacy plan is designed with your convenience and costs in mind. Here's how to get the medicine you need, when you need it.

Mail-order pharmacy

Consider a mail-order pharmacy for medicines you take every day. These are drugs that treat chronic conditions, such as arthritis, asthma, diabetes, high cholesterol, heart conditions and hypertension. They are called maintenance medications.

Depending on your plan design, you can get up to a 90-day supply of your medicines, with your doctor's approval. No trips to a retail pharmacy. And you could save money with a 90-day supply, too.

Aetna Rx Home Delivery^® can fill and refill them for you through the mail.

Specialty pharmacy

Specialty medicines* help with complex conditions such as multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis or anemia. They can be injected, infused or taken by mouth. They are often expensive. These drugs usually need careful handling, refrigeration or special storage.

When you order from a specialty pharmacy, you get extra support from trained nurses and pharmacists while you take these drugs.

Learn more about Aetna Specialty Pharmacy^®.

* Specialty medications through Aetna Specialty Pharmacy and the Specialty Pharmacy Network may not be available to California HMO members.  Talk to your doctor about the appropriate way to get the specialty medications you need.  Doctors may have agreed to dispense and administer these drugs to you themselves.  Or they may write a prescription so you can fill them at any participating retail or mail-order pharmacy.

Retail pharmacy 

Retail pharmacies typically fill drugs for 30-day supplies, or less. You might use a retail pharmacy to fill a prescription for an acute condition. Some antibiotic prescriptions are written for a 10-day supply. You get lower rates when you order from pharmacies in our network.

Retail pharmacies can also fill prescriptions for maintenance drugs. But, you could save time and money, depending on your prescription plan benefits, by using a mail-order pharmacy.

Note: If you go to a pharmacy not in the network, you will pay full price for the drug and you will need to fill out and submit a claim form to request reimbursement.