Every day, Dr. Alan Hutchison has to decide which medications to prescribe to patients. But it’s not always as simple as just choosing the best drug.
As a physician to many low-income patients at University of Chicago Medicine on the city’s South Side, he has to take into account whether his patients can afford particular medications. He has to consider whether they’ll have enough money or insurance coverage to refill those prescriptions down the road.
Sometimes he has to compromise, putting patients on medications that aren’t his first choice, because they’re more affordable.
