The question isn’t if medical marijuana works for Kevin Hernandez, a leg amputee who deals with phantom pains and neuropathy. He said it does.
Rather, the Albany man and his sister, Christine, are grappling with how they’ll pay for it.
"He was like, ‘Hey, Chris, I’m going to start on this … but it’s costing a lot,’ she said, referring to her brother’s request for financial help. "When I went for him, I was like, wow, this is a lot of money in comparison to a $10 co-pay for OxyContin or whatever else he was on at the time."
Kevin Hernandez is one of thousands of beneficiaries of the state-run medical marijuana program. But as patients like him struggle to scrape together hundreds or even thousands of dollars per month to pay for drugs out of pocket, one of the state’s five medical marijuana producers plans to start a repeat customer discount program in an effort to build up their customer base.
Etain, which grows and produces its products in Warren County and maintains a dispensary in Albany’s Warehouse District, plans to offer discounts worth a percentage of the value of the medication consumers purchase. The discount would increase as the value purchased increases, and patients will have the flexibility to apply it when they choose.
For every $100 spent, patients will receive a $5 discount. The discount increases in increments of $5 until customers hit $400. After that, discounts are stepped up to $10 per every $100 spent until purchases hit $1,000. After $1,000, the discount amount goes up to $15 per $100 spent.
The program is to begin Tuesday at Etain’s four dispensaries statewide and is the latest incentive concocted by one of the five registered organizations, as they are known, in an effort to step up marketing efforts. Etain already offers a five percent discount for new customers.
"It’s necessary to provide access to patients first," Etain COO Hillary Peckham said. "If we can find more ways for patients to afford the medication, then more people can access the program."
While ultimately the hope is that a discount program builds a more robust customer base, which is good for the bottom line, the necessity for new marketing strategies is borne from some of the program’s core set of struggles.
For patients, a lack of insurance coverage for medical marijuana a substance that remains illegal on the federal level leads to sky-high, out-of-pocket costs in some cases. Take Kevin Hernandez as an example: His sister said the medication has cost about $400 to $500 per month (before discounts).
For registered organizations, the issue is the patient base still is growing at a slow enough rate that the cash they’re raking in hasn’t yet made it feasible to dramatically drop their prices.
As of last week, 12,764 patients had been certified by 833 practitioners to take part in the medical marijuana program. But how many of those patients are using medical marijuana isn’t clear.
Etain reports that roughly 20 percent of customers in a given month don’t return because of cost prohibitions. Peckham said when the business first began a year ago, roughly 50 percent were not returning, but price reductions have helped with customer retention.
Compare that to what Peckham said is maybe one or two patients out of 200 polled each month by the company who say they don’t return because the medicine did not work for them.
A Capital Region practitioner who is registered for the medical marijuana program has found similar numbers of one-time buyers among his patient base. Dr. Francisco Gomez, a Colonie neurologist, said roughly 15 percent of the patients he has seen in the past month have reported that they did not purchase medical marijuana following their last visit because they could not afford it. Instead, he said some patients return to using other pain medications they previously relied on, have turned to the illicit market for marijuana or have sought medicinal strains from other states, which may be a federal crime in some instances.
Even those who can afford high-cost New York-sanctioned medical marijuana products are careful about how often they use them.
"What about half of them will do is they’ll try to hoard it, so they’ll save it for when they really, really, really need it," Gomez said. "I have a few patients who say they will just try to go without it, use it less often."
For Christine Hernandez, helping Kevin, who uses Etain products, obtain medical marijuana isn’t something that is open to debate, even with the high prices.
"The cost, of course, is an issue," she said. "But … it’s your baby brother, you’ve gotta help him out."
News Moderator: Katelyn Baker
Full Article: Discounts Planned For Repeat New York Medical Marijuana Customers
Author: Matthew Hamilton
Contact: (518) 454-5694
Photo Credit: John Carl D’Annibale
Website: Times Union
