Comparison shopping for drugs.

Trying to save money on your state's prescription drug costs? Confused about which drugs are most effective--and cost-effective? Go to www.ohsu.edu/drugeffectiveness. That's the address of the Web site for the Drug Effectiveness Review Project at the Center for Evidence-Based Policy, Oregon Health Sciences University.

The project compares the efficacy of drugs that are used to treat the same condition and produces reports that reveal which drugs are most effective. The results are then posted on the Web site for all to use, free of charge.

"We need to know which drugs work better and are worth the money we're spending--and which ones do not," says Dr. John Kitzhaber, director of the Center for Evidence-Based Policy. States can add information on prices to the reports and use them to com pile preferred drug lists for Medicaid, to decide when switching to generic or over-the- counter medications is appropriate, to negotiate for lower bids from drug companies, and to assess medical decision-making for patients in nursing homes or correctional facilities.

The reports help states make decisions on drug coverage that are clinically sound, says Wisconsin Medicaid Director Mark Moody. Wisconsin Medicaid's preferred drug list and prior authorization policies are expected to save the state $86 million over the biennium of June 2003 to July 2005. The project reports have contributed to those savings, although they are not solely responsible, he says. The three-year, $4.2 million project is supported by 12 states and two organizations (Alaska, Arkansas, Idaho, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, North Carolina, Oregon, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming, as well as the California Healthcare Foundation and the Canadian Coordinating Office for Health Technology). So far, the center's researchers have reviewed more than 13 classes of drugs, ranging from drugs for migraines to those for diabetes and urinary incontinence.