Amarin Corp Plc (AMRN)

[Birdbrain Ideas]

My experience at being prescribed Vascepa for the first time probably reflects the troubles of Amarin and the whole skinny label thing.

First, my cardiologist -- who has worked with Dr. Bhatt in the past and is a big fan of Vascepa and prescribes it for other patients -- finally agreed to prescribe it for me after I've been bugging her over it for several years. I told her to specify that I get the brand so that they don't give me a generic. She said that was unnecessary because generics are not available yet for Vascepa. I told her that was not so and that generics got a skinny label six years ago and had taken over a big chunk of Vascepa's patented market. She told me she would specify. So I went to the CVS in Hoboken, New Jersey, and picked up my prescription, taking two pills in the dark the next morning. The pharmacist even told me that they're seeing an increase in prescriptions for it. I was confident I'd been given Vascepa after reading all the stuff about Amarin restoring its exclusive contract with CVS.

Only that evening did I notice that CVS had given me a generic. When I took the bottle back to the CVS, they told me they only dispense the generic, regardless of the prescription. I told them that violates patents because generics only have a skinny label for what would result in about 7 percent of Vascepa prescriptions. They didn't seem to know about that or care. I told them my triglycerides are fine and high triglycerides were the only thing generics were supposed to be dispensed for. The pharmacist read my prescription and said it was for "lipids." Then she said lipids and triglycerides are the same thing. I told her I was pretty certain they are not.

Anyhow, my doctor's assistant called the CVS and told them to dispense Vascepa to me when the prescription renews at the end of this month. At least my doctor's office, which apparently writes a fair amount of Vascepa prescriptions, at least now knows to specify the brand. But the whole thing was very discouraging.

The whole experience also made me wonder if Amarin even makes a minimal effort to let cardiologists who write a lot of Vascepa prescriptions know that there is a skinny label on the market now and they need to specify Vascepa brand. How could they not make sure doctors know about this? It's been six years.