title: Contingent valuation and pharmacists' acceptable levels of compensation for medication therapy management services.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Pharmacists' acceptable level of compensation for medication therapy management (MTM) services needs to be determined using various economic evaluation techniques.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  Using contingent valuation method, determine pharmacists' acceptable levels of compensation for MTM services.
  
  
  METHODS
  A mailing survey was used to elicit Tennessee (U.S.) pharmacists' acceptable levels of compensation for a 30-minute MTM session for a new patient with 2 medical conditions, 8 medications, and an annual drug cost of $2000. Three versions of a series of double-bounded, closed-ended, binary discrete choice questions were asked of pharmacists for their willingness to accept (WTA) for an original monetary value ($30, $60, or $90) and then follow-up higher or lower value depending on their responses to the original value. A Kaplan-Meier approach was taken to analyze pharmacists' WTA, and Cox's proportional hazards model was used to examine the effects of pharmacist characteristics on their WTA.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Three hundred and forty-eight pharmacists responded to the survey. Pharmacists' WTA for the given MTM session had a mean of $63.31 and median of $60. The proportions of pharmacists willing to accept $30, $60, and $90 for the given MTM session were 30.61%, 85.19%, and 91.01%, respectively. Pharmacists' characteristics had statistically significant association with their WTA rates.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Pharmacists' WTA for the given MTM session is higher than current Medicare MTM programs' compensation levels of $15-$50 and patients' willingness to pay of less than $40. Besides advocating for higher MTM compensation levels by third-party payers, pharmacists also may need to charge patients to reach sufficient compensation levels for MTM services.
authors.affiliation: College of Pharmacy, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Division of Health Outcomes and Policy Research, 881 Madison Avenue, Room 221, Memphis, TN 38163, USA. Electronic address: jwang26@uthsc.edu.
authors.forename: Junling
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: College of Pharmacy, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Division of Health Outcomes and Policy Research, 881 Madison Avenue, Room 221, Memphis, TN 38163, USA.
authors.forename: Song Hee
authors.initials: SH
authors.lastname: Hong
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D035881:Compensation and Redress; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007349:Insurance, Health, Reimbursement / Q000191:economics*; D053208:Kaplan-Meier Estimate; D008297:Male; D006278:Medicare; D054539:Medication Therapy Management / Q000191:economics* / Q000458:organization & administration; D008875:Middle Aged; D010595:Pharmacists / Q000191:economics*; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013714:Tennessee; D014481:United States