No not quite but they do have long queues due to their good prices. If you were to use them, drop off the script go shopping then 4 hours later when you are ready to leave, pick it up! Or get the doctors office to fax in.

Prescription glasses from Costco too.

BC is (I think) unique in Canada in that it charges a premium for the Medical Services Plan. This is $150 a month for a family of three or more. MSP covers free-at-the-point-of-use NHS style access to doctors (either GP or walk-in clinic), specialists and hospital treatment.

Everything else you pay for out of pocket unless you have an extended health plan. This includes prescription drugs, dentistry, glasses, physiotherapy and (to save the pill pusher's blushes) what you may call complementary medicine. Almost all kids have orthodontic treatment in their teens and this is expensive.

As mentioned, Fair Pharmacare protects against catastrophic drug costs.

Pharmacare don't inform you of what your deductible is, however you can call them and they will tell you once you are registered. You can also get updates on the phone of how much you has contributed in eligible prescriptions.

Pharmacare do not cover lancets and only a limited amount for test strips. They will use a generic drug unless the doc specifies 'brand name only'. If the cheap drug is not effective, they will in some instance approve a higher priced one, or the doc and apply for a 'Special Authority' if there is a good reason to. This does not guarantee it will be covered, but worth a shot.

If you have extended health, this only pays what MSP and Pharmacare don't pay for.

Drug Coverage - Province of British Columbia

I think we may just have to stay in the UK purely for the reason of spending four hours shopping in Costco !! I hate shopping and I am female!!

I just saw the $150 premium so that's not so bad. Will have a look at the extended plans next.

So basically, MSP (essential to join), Fair Pharmacare and Extended Health are all necessary join if you self fund but it would be better to go through the company you work for assuming they can provide an extended health plan? Have I finally got it !!??

I still don't understand how the deductible works but one step at a time. I have learnt pretty much everything immigration wise that there is to know thanks to the guys on the immi forum in three days, so this is my next subject !

MSP is mandatory. Pharmacare worthwhile, extended if you have a work plan, otherwise too expensive in my view. What you claim this year, they will take back next year in higher premiums.

http://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/hea...re_regular.pdf

https://www.health.gov.bc.ca/pharmac...alculator.html

OK,got it !! You have all been so helpful. Thank you! Really appreciate the time you have given me with this.

Déja vu!

Having read many of your posts I think I'll fall off my chair if you don't have very good coverage through your employer.

Snoopdawg mentioned about this forum not being representative of Canadians in terms of good employer coverage.

It's quite similar to annual leave which appears to be about two weeks normally for Canadians. Those on this forum who get the good medical coverage tend to be those who get the same annual leave allowances common in the UK.

If you know your leave allowance is similar to what you'd get in the UK, chances are your medical coverage is likely as good as it gets and your employer has taken it for granted you expect it.

I can't think of anyone ever posting that they've had well above 'normal' annual leave but not had above normal health benefits. They seem to go hand in hand.

Thanks for the confidence !

I will be very interested what they offer.

I have Alberta Blue Cross. They give $600 a year towards diabetic supplies (test strips, needles, etc.) Once the $600 is used up, I have to pay for everything myself.

Their policy says that my contribution towards each item on prescription should not cost me more than $25. So, if I have a prescription that gives me lantus, novorapid and test strips, the cost of the test strips is governed by what I have outlined above, and the maximum the lantus and novorapid can be is $25 each. As they allow a maximum of 3 months worth of drugs per prescription, it pays to always request 3 months of each for a cost of $25. If, for example, I requested a months worth of each, each would cost me $25, so would cost $75 for 3 months worth.

Possibly something like this, lifted from a new thread.

as someone that needs very expensive medication(since becoming PR) and lost my job and health care plan ,the employer I ended up with now has no plan !! ! I also lost my specialist as well and had to sign up with a clinic in the big city and by luck a very good specialist whom along with the drug company got me on to government pharmacare at minimal cost to me. if I told you the biweekly cost of my epipen you would not believe me but as the specialist told me without them I would have no quality of life ...its hard for me to post this as I love life in Canada but its not all good especialy if you have a for ever illness and no coverage..

I absolutely agree- drug costs I see has a huge differentiator between NHS and Canadian Health systems . As you say if you have benefits great but not if you don't not so good We have to ask patients if they have extended benefits or not and prescribe sometimes differently according to ability to pay or not.

Until three or four years ago I didn't have a benefit plan and just paid personally for drugs, orthodontics, surgical appliances and so on. It's rare for people in our business to have any sort of drug or extended health plan. I found that most suppliers were willing to advance bill in December for items to be used in the coming year, that was advantageous from a tax perspective.

And presumably get the ball rolling for a special authority if appropriate.

Sad to say our doc didn't have a clue what was likely covered on the province plan my wife eventually got covered by.

He'd give the prescription, we'd go to the pharmacy...oh it's not covered. Actually we got into the habit of checking on the formulary but we still had to go through the motions of trying to get it it. Why?

Because he wanted something from them to say not covered before he'd either do an alternative, apply for SA or we'd give up and pay or not according to whether we could.

The pharm staff thought it unnecessary (he actually did it once without wanting them to do their bit) but went along with it to get some kind of result.

One drug he prescribed I looked up the conditions for a special authority. "Tried at least two other meds of the same type with no success."

Back we went - "we think she'd qualify for the SA"
Okay leave it with me.
A few days later we see him again and he says they won't allow it and gives us what we think is their decision which we take away.

At home we look and it's a print of the very pages we looked at.

Back we go, I have the parts about at least two drugs underlined and refer him to the three that he's previously prescribed.

Of course we both know that these three were of the same type but we can't come across all know-it-all, so we "ask" if they were of the same type.

So he does the SA request and it's allowed.

Glad to say he got a lot better at this stuff.