Adderall Backorder (Page 22) (Top voted first)

I take generic Adderall 20 mg for narcolepsy and there is not one local pharmacy that has it in stock. I have never had this problem before. The pharmacies are saying that it's on backorder from the manufacturer. Is anyone else having problems getting their scripts filled?

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Re: Rcma666 (# 1268)

This was an interesting read--adhdrolIercoaster. I had to switch from brand name Adderall to generic in 2019 due to the cost. I was finding Barr then Teva at Walgreens until early 2020.

I have no idea how I will proceed. My doctor said today they didn't know of any pharmacy that was taking new patients for Adderall.

Publix was not helpful.

MY OPINION is the DEA and FDA are hoping those of us who require Adderall to function will just go away and die.

It also makes me wonder how many non controlled generic drugs are sub standard. Could that be causing deaths among unsuspecting people with heart disease, diabetes, hypertension, etc.

The Quora and Reddit forums on ADHD and Adderall do not seem to discuss the shortage.

When I became stable on Adderall in 2007, I stopped doing research.

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Re: Just Jamie (# 1288)

Yes! Walgreens! Clearly they can get SOME….convinced this is a greed issue and not a true back order one. Already getting anxiety for next month not sure i’ll get so lucky again.

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Re: Rcma666 (# 1305)

Yes, I read about Gottleib, head of the FDA for a year. Appointed by D. Trump.

I have good news, I hope. My Walgreens pharmacist left. Today there was a woman, she wasn't busy, so I told her what a hard time I was having with the poor generics. I asked if she was able to order a specific generic "brand". She said the district manager did not allow that.

I asked if she saw Teva in any of the stores where she worked. She went to the cabinet to look while I was there. I told her any strength of Teva would be great. She had looked at my profile and saw that I was out of Adderall. I said I was taking Focalin but didn't like the side affects so usually did not take them. She looked and said they only had Camber in 20mg but had 30mg Teva. I got sort of excited and started yammering (I had taken 2 Focalin to go grocery shopping and ask at Publix again about Teva). My doctor comes back from vacation on Monday so I will have him send a script. She said they definitely had 60. She also said she thought they had come in last week. She won't be there Monday but a female co-worker will be working. You are right, the women are easier to talk to. She was eyeballing me for my talking so much. I was happy I was having a really good day for a change. I can be paranoid. My concern is that they won't always have the Teva.

In the past I have written to a Walgreens district manager but didn't ask for his/her name. Maybe on Monday. She said something about the dm and asked me if I knew her--the blond she said. I have seen a blind woman there many times but thought she was a tech as she worked the pick up windows. My Walgreens is set up differently as you cannot see the people filling prescriptions from the pick up window, except in a mirror.

What I can't understand is they will take a Good Rx coupon for 30mg x 60 at $30 but balk at insurance that pays more.

You know the chains are paying pharmacists less than they did in the 90s. Apparently a bunch of "easier to pass" pharmacy schools opened and were churning out entry level pharmacists very quickly No PharmDs. So no one cares about the patients any more. Maybe we ought to remind them who keeps them in business.

I take the IRs because they give me more control on good days and bad days. I took the brand until 2020. The cost rose rapidly after 2006 ish.

I am hoping for the best and these low quality manufacturers get kicked to the curb so to speak

Good luck everyone.

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Re: Cyr (# 1304)

I feel like it has ended the world as I once knew it. I had went to a pharmacy that would get me the brand I asked for and when they only had a partial would give me the rest when they got them. I have traded with them for past few years. Then they got camber and they quit trying to get the meds for me. So in the past in my town the pharmacist would say they had ordered them but they never came in. I gave up on them when I found this last one. I seen the order sheet and it seemed legitimate. They said the 29th but the pharmacist said there was no guarantee. I am going to call today and ask them to make sure and order them for the 29th. I have been without medication for over a month now. I feel like street drugs are the only option but I don't want to get on that merry-go-round again. I am 64 almost 65 years old and well I am not abusing the medication. I was for 20 years over medicated by the physician I use to have up until he retired. When he retired I went through withdraw hell. I had been taking 180 mg of Adderall a day, 1-2 Xanax 2mg a day, and Lortabs at 180 mg a day. I don't recall anything much for about 30 days. The thing I still won't take is pain medication. I withdrew from that the worse. I never took the Xanax much so it was not a problem. I don't withdraw from Adderall I just turn into a b.... . I cant get up and accomplish anything. But most of all my memory is bad. I can not even go into another room to get something and remember what it is. Total lack of concentration. I am so tired of feeling this way.

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Re: BlessedLady (# 1332)

The reduction in dosage was due to my psych organization changing ownership. The new owners micro-manage the actions of all their prescribers. I realize 120 mg was over the recommended dosage, but my insurance company only required the waiver for exceeding 100 mg daily. I had 6 different prescribers over a 20 yr. period who all prescribed me 120 mg a day. When I turned 70, the insurance company sent the psych organization a paper alerting them that some senior patients do not tolerate amphetamine type prescriptions well. I understand that, but I would think the patient would be the best source for determining whether or not a certain drug is tolerated well. If I'm not having any adverse effects from the drug, why disrupt my life? I don't know how old you are, but I can tell you that the confusion ADD causes doesn't get any better with age. I always think I'm in good shape until I go for more than a few days without my pills.

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I am about one and a half month without medication. I did write to Teva and ask them if there was a problem with getting the medication. I also got a response. It said they had shipped Teva brand to the warehouse that Walgreens uses. I have had poor experiences with Walgreens and CVS in the town I live in. I take 4 20 mg tabs a day. I have a waver from my insurance to cover them. When I got the response from Teva telling me to go to Walgreens I called my Doctor and asked him to send my prescription over there. I asked them to order it for me. This was about 3 weeks ago. I went to the pharmacy on the day they said to see if I could get my medication. They said they were on back order until the 29 of July so I waited again. I even called and asked the to not forget to order them for me. When I called them that following week they told me that they were on back order and it could be as long as September. I told them I don't believe you. then I hung up the phone. Its the same judgement problem I have at all pharmacies in this town. I was going to a town over that is bigger and used a small pharmacy that would go out of their way to get them for me. They said they couldn't get them and offered me another generic which I declined because some others cause me to get angry when I take them. I am angry now. I have been since I have been out of meds. I am barely able to function and don't know what to do. If I tell my doctor he will probably discontinue writing the prescription because he does it half hearted anyways. I am wondering what I can do? I don't think anyone I am dealing with realizes how this affects my life. I am writing because it relieves the anger somewhat. Thank you all.

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Re: Cyr (# 1349)

Ironically all the cognitive energy going into finding your meds is negatively impacting pre-existing cognitive fatigue

IOW at a certain point, all the effort has diminishing returns and you're susceptible to being the creator of the fatigue. Think "serenity prayer". Know what you can change and what you cannot. Re-organizing life around realities is skillful adaptation. Winter coats in Winter and light cotton in summer, right? Seems basic. Well, we're experiencing a drought of quality ADD meds.... Adapt accordingly. So imo at this point.... We are our own advocates. There is so much chaos in America and pharma right now; the supply chain rules everything; quarterly profit reports determine all decisions by pharma, not public health or ethics. I'm not being salty ... actually just calling the balls and strikes: at this point, forget about how it used to be because it's not going back. Decisions have obviously been made behind closed doors. These formulations for Adderall and such is the "New Coke" and nobody at the FDA, TEVA, Lannett, MALLIINKRODT, DEA, or any pharmacy benefit management company, pharmacy or doctor's office gives a damn. Global wheat shortages, energy costs, political culture wars, domestic terrorism and absurd obsessions about pronouns and women's health choices are way higher on the agenda for 99.9% of the bureaucracy, administrative state, Wall Street and law enforcement. I'm not holding my breath that this is going to change. Pan out, widen the lens... This is a non-issue to everyone except people who need the medication (who honestly are not the power brokers). Look at the US - most battles are about wanting things to be the way they used to be. But not everyone agrees on the utopian baseline. Sorry if I sound preachy. But I'm just trying to help by saying "welcome to how it is and it's not going back "

https:/­/­www.cnn.com/­2022/­08/­11/­health/­cognitive-fatigue-study-wellness/­index.html

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Re: Rcma (# 1353)

I don't think urine sample will tell how much drug is in the system, especially between manufacturers. They are notoriously inaccurate, in my opinion, from my experience. During my depressive years, I took an overdose of Xanax but my blood test from the hospital indicated no benzodiazepines in my blood.

After all these years of fighting, I suppose I will let it go, doing what I can when I can and resting and sleeping the rest of the time. My main issue is getting started and finishing. I do alright as long as I get started. I am much more tired now than I was 5 years ago but it could be due to other stressors - death of friends, increased physical pain, general dissatisfaction with world events, etc.

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Re: Rue (# 1357)

I was fortunate to have gotten TEVA adderall 2 weeks ago. I'm going to get off of it cause it's not worth the hassle anymore. Does CVS have it or not, month after month. And, it isn't even good stuff. 2 to 3 years ago adderall was good. It's not an excellent drug anymore. I'm finding the same aggravation with pain meds. 1 script is good and the next is terrible. It's absolute BS that all medications aren't what they once were. I'm sure this holds true for antidepressants and other meds. Damn shame it's like this.

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Re: Rcma (# 1365)

It would make sense that the spike is in August as that is back to school time. Many long time kids take Adderall will take a vacation from it over the summer. But still you would think it this time TEVA would prepare for this. As it goes too long then he would patients switch to another medication. I’ve been on it 25 years so it really affects someone like me.

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Re: West Palm Beach Gal (# 1374)

They are doing this on purpose. Wake up!

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I refill on the 28th and I'm worried. This thread gives me such anxiety lol

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Re: Rcma (# 1378)

The DEA is the supplier of amphetamines. They are a schedule II substance. DEA sets a fixed amount each year based on the demand of the previous year. Companies can't just choose how many pills they want to make. They have to work within their share of the quota.

It used to be that the DEA gave the whole supply to 1 company, the brand company Shire. And based on contracts with generic brands it would supply them their contracted quota. But they manipulated the market and created a shortage and didn't supply their generic companies and instead made brand name / patent protected Vyvanse with the amphetamines. Which created the shortage, I think back in 2012?

Not sure if the raw materials are distributed the same way or not currently. But demand has gone way up this year (you can search online for details) and the DEA is very reluctant to increase quotas on amphetamines.

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Call a hospital pharmacy - i just tried that, and while they didn’t have the full amount of adderall IR i take in stock (30 mg 4x daily), they said that they can have it ordered and in stock within 72 hours. I guess a hospital has more of it warehoused than some of these chain pharmacies. Good luck -

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Re: Wpbgal42 (# 1403)

How did Outreach RX get your phone number?

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Re: Cyr (# 1349)

I don’t know. Things feel pretty desperate. I can completely relate to you in that it’s been really difficult for me to function at all let alone conger up the energy to call pharmacies, argue with my insurance company and communicate with my doctor. My doctor is a GP. I started seeing her after my psych retired 2 years ago, and while she’s been great and reliable, she is not knowledgeable about neurodivergence and is very strict as I think she’s nervous about prescribing a controlled substance (how Adderall somehow got on the same list as OxyContin and phetermine is truly absurd. It’s prescribed to children for gods sake!)

I guess my plan is to find a psychiatrist who’s taking new patients who would be willing to prescribe me non-generic Adderall (or at least Sandoz). Just thinking about how much of a pain that’s going to be makes me want to crawl into bed and give up.

The forms and drug tests and pill counts and wait periods and constantly feeling paranoid that I could say or do one wrong thing and have my name flagged and medication revoked forever is so stressful. Building the trust of a new, suspicious doctor who will be hesitant to even take me as a patient due to the pain in the ass it is to prescribe my medication… omg.

I have a full time job and a life and bills - I do not have the capacity for all of this.

The shortage is bad enough, but when you finally pick up your meds and they barely work. It’s too much.

How is it acceptable for a medication to not be available to patients who need it?

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Re: Stephiep (# 1431)

I wrote this previously, but here's some info for you too. I'm just outside of Grand Rapids and have excellent results with Costco. I use goodrx (site or app) for great prices and a listing based on prices of places to go for it. I haven't found a time Costco isn't in stock. I only take Teva brand sometimes I have to get a partial order though. You don't have to be a Costco member and if you want because it just may be cheaper, you can use your insurance too.

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Re: GoodDadGang617 (# 1449)

This happened to me at Walmart years ago and they actually gave it to me. But it was a whole shady thing.

It's really simple now... You walk into the pharmacy and speak to the pharmacist. "hi Jen. How are you? I'm so sorry to bother you but could you please check if you have this? No? Would you be so kind as to check your system right now for availability because I gladly come back in a day or two when your shipment comes in."

SRSLY. It's like applying for a job.

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Re: Hilariouspeople (# 1427)

Wow, you are harsh. I find it interesting to know you can "tell" a person is lazy from reading a little blurb written on the forum.
1. Adderall is not a narcotic, it is a stimulant
2. There was prescription methamphetamine long before people began cooking their own. I know because I took it along with thousands of truck drivers in the 1960s, 1970s.
3. Non-medical terms are sometimes used to describe psychological conditions that do not have a diagnostic term of their own but are associated with a diagnosis like ADHD. Neurodivergent is one. Executive dysfunction is another that is a symptom of ADHD and a major hindrance to me for getting things done.

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Re: B (# 1453)

Have you tried any of the smaller pharmacies (non-chain) or even compounding pharmacies?

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