I've been looking for this information all over the internet, but I can't find anything about it. Here's the question- I always fill my new script for 10mg Ritalin on the 6th of every month. The last one I filled was May 6th, so Im coming up on another refill on June 6th. Problem is, I am going out of town and will not be home on the 6th. My doctor went ahead and gave me the script early, but she wasn't sure how soon the pharmacy would let me fill it. Does anyone know how soon I can fill the new script? All the prescriptions are a 30 days supply. Do I have to wait 30 days between the 2, or will they let me fill it early if the script is dated now? Not sure if it's different from state to state, but I live in NC. If anyone can offer a guess, it would be greatly appreciated.

It probably varies from place to place, but I haven't had problems as long as it's only been a few days early. You might just need to try and discuss it with the pharmacist if they know you and explain the situation.

Scattered

You can have it filled at a pharmacy out of town, that's what I did when I was in the same situation.

you should also consider checking with your insurance provider. some allow you a 24-48 hour window to refill. some make you wait the full time. others may be different, I'm not sure.

I think it's a day or so, but I could be wrong

The insurance is the problem, if you pay cash you can fill it whenever you want, as long as you are not doing this often (every other month) you will not run into problems. Just be honest when you talk to the Pharmacist.

Most insurance will refill the script once 75-80% of it is suppose to be gone. Filling it out of town will not help as the insurance will still deny the claim as refilled too soon.

Filling prescriptions early at a different pharmacy looks really suspicious, makes it seem like your trying to take advantage of the system, in the pharmacy world we call this "shopping", do this enough and both pharmacies may start refusing to fill your scripts.

I don't get this. I don't have a car every day so most days I use the pharmacy I've been using for years, but I have to drive there. There's another pharmacy I can walk to but I don't really like it - it's crowded and the people are rather rude; I only use that one if I don't have the car. So I use 2 different pharmacies. Sometimes, if someone is REALLY sick, I might even use one (same chain) across the st from the hospital. So actually I've used 3. No one has ever asked or given me a hard time, it's just a matter of convenience, and I only think about it at tax time when I need to get forms from all 3 for 4 family members which can me a pain. My parents do this too - they use at least 3 or 4 different pharmacies depending on location of the dr's office is where they got the script.

Or are you asking when your payor will allow it filled? That's another story, and as others mentioned, company specific. Most will allow a vacation waiver (I know the one I worked for did; it required a letter).

I said, "Filling prescriptions EARLY at a different pharmacy looks really suspicious...” The only reason for this is most ADD meds are schedule 2 controlled substances with high abuse potential.