Prescription drug costs have risen rapidly over the past few years, leading employers and health plans to look for ways to reduce this cost growth.  Employers have used a variety of strategies to reduce this cost growth.  Raising cost sharing levels and introducing financial arrangements which give workers incentives to select less expensive drugs.  These trends continued in 2003.

Coverage limits, including caps on the numbers of inpatient and outpatient visits, remain a common feature of mental health benefits, despite federal and state laws encouraging greater parity between mental health and other health benefits.  Workers in small firms (3-199 workers) are approximately twice as likely as workers in large firms (200 or more workers) to have tight restrictions on both outpatient and inpatient mental health visits.