Pharmacies Can Sometimes Refill Your Prescriptions in Advance
You may have heard advice (even from us !) to bring extra medication with you when you go on vacation, or to stash a large supply in your emergency preparedness kit. But if the medicines you take regularly are prescription drugs, where are you supposed to get all those extra doses? Enter early replenishment.
You can usually only refill a recipe when your supply runs out. But for most drugs, you can sometimes get an early refill. Reasons that are usually allowed include:
- You are going on vacation and you need extra funds to get through the trip and have enough funds in case of travel delays.
- Your medicine has been lost or stolen.
- A potential weather emergency is looming, for example if forecasts predict a hurricane in your area.
You may also receive an early top-up for other reasons, such as when you leave your job. Policies vary, but on this Reddit thread , several people report that they can get a “holiday” top-up on such occasions without pretending they’re going on vacation.
How to request an early recharge
The process for requesting an early refill involves some exchanges between your pharmacist and your insurance company, and may sometimes include your provider. For this reason, you should ask for a refill when there is still enough time, and not the day before you leave for your holiday.
Typically, the pharmacist has to ask the insurance company to cancel, a process that is sometimes quick but may involve making a phone call during business hours and waiting for a response. If you have a few days’ notice of a problem that prompts you to get an early supplement, contact your pharmacy as soon as you know about it.
Early replenishment is usually not available for controlled medications such as opioids. Talk to your pharmacist about what qualifies and what options you have if you can’t get everything refilled early. If you are traveling, sometimes you can get your prescription from the pharmacy in your destination.
Some states allow pharmacies to dispense drugs early in emergencies. For example, in Florida, if the governor issued an emergency declaration, pharmacists can dispense a 30-day supply of essential drugs and notify the provider thereafter. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has a list of prescribed state of emergency laws here .