What Is The Best Generic Version Of Wellbutrin Xl - Watson Or Anchen? (Page 43)

My doctor will not prescribe generic Wellbutrin XL but my insurance will no longer pay for brand name drugs. I will have to pay about $7000 per yer for what I am taking now (3 of the 150mg Wellbutrin XL brand name per day). I am reading that the problem with the generics is the time release mechanism and not the drug itself and that some are better than others. Anybody have experience with the generics made by Watson and /or Anchen?

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Comment #840 is both defamatory and paranoid. If anyone is believing this kind of thinking, then consider throwing all your meds in the trash, since Indian and Chinese raw materials and manufacture make up most of the US supply chain.

Putting aside the notion about excrement and other contaminants, Indian labs have legitimately come under fire for corrupt practices that affected drug quality and potency. The FDA in recent times has banned certain generics produced by Ranbaxy Labs, Sun Pharma and others. Accordingly, I refuse to purchase any generic produced by these Indian pharma companies.

That in fact is one of the main reasons that I choose Mylan. Their internal QC process takes a hard line on drug quality, and they even championed a US law that permits the FDA to inspect drug manufacturing facilities of any US supplier. They have one global standard for quality throughout the world too, and that's how it should be.

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FYI: Valeant (the maker of Wellbutrin) has been subpoenaed over its Patient Assistance Program i.e. the one that is run by Direct Success Pharmacy. Valeant described Direct Success in a press statement as "reputable". Valeant is also under investigation for a number of other shady practices, including exploitative pricing of generic drugs.

Looks like the poop has hit the fan for Direct Success.

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Yeah, but WE are the ones who are going to get massively screwed by this. When it's all over, there will be no wellbutrin left that works for us, or it certainly won't be available for $50/month.

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It’s too early to know what Valeant’s fate will be, but I’m not thinking this will be an Enron-type scandal i.e. it’s not going to turn out to be some huge Ponzi scheme. Even if they did go bankrupt, their Wellbutrin property would be sold to another company at a discount, and they too would necessarily run a Patient Assistance Program.

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if you go on the website for Valeant pharma, you will see that they will provide the brand of Wellbutrin for $50 a month. Hope this helps.

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Eric, The politicians will get involved, and they will make speeches about what an evil company Valeant is, and then Valeant will simply abandon Direct Success over the bad publicity. If the publicity is bad enough, they will also abandon all of the drugs that they sold through Direct Success. This will have nothing to do with being good or evil, it is their fiduciary responsibility to their stockholders to protect the value of the company. And "their stockholders" is our retirement money, so we better hope they succeed. Otherwise we won't have to worry about paying for our anti-depressants, because we won't be able to afford to buy cat food to eat.

This is what happened when Teva's 300mg was shown to be different from Valeant's 300mg -- they stopped making the 150mg, too. And Watson did the same thing. That happened without any new laws, even -- if the politicians decide to get elected by demonizing the drug companies, then it will be far worse.

Yes, we are the ones in the front-row seats for this s***-storm, and we are going to get covered in s***. It's already started, and there is nothing that we can do to stop it.

Valeant could have had a sweet, sweet deal. The generics are $10/month, but bad publicity has eliminated the two 150mg generics that work, and Valeant could have made billions selling real Wellbutin for $50/month. But they got greedy, and figured out this way to get by the insurance company cost controls and get $500/month for some of us by tricking insured patients into helping them rip off their insurance companies. And now it's all going to go to hell for them -- but for us, too.

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Eric -- I'm not paranoid. I'm PISSED OFF that my spouse and I were forced into taking Mylan wellbutrin xl by our insurance co. and we both have suffered due to its ineffectiveness along with side effects that include body pain and thoughts of suicide. I highly resent that half of what I buy as a consumer, let alone my medication, comes from places that are known for practices that are not only substandard, but often subhuman-- yet CHEAP, which is why USA businesses use them. So, if I want to be angry about that, well, then, tough "poop" as you say. As far as being "defamatory" -- here in the united states, we have freedom of speech, and nothing I said is far from the truth. I'm just really passionate about the safety of the MEDICATION that I put in my body, especially when the People's Pharmacy reported in an article regarding Ranbaxy that -- "FDA inspectors noted the laboratory was in “significant disrepair.” Windows could not be closed and flies were “too numerous to count.” A refrigerator used to store samples was full of water from melting ice that was dripping on the floor." --- You clearly seem to trust Mylan, good for you, but at the end of the day, we really don't know what we're getting 100%, not when it's coming from another country, another culture, from thousands of miles away. Not to mention that when it comes to generic drugs, there is NO recourse for the consumer. You can't win trying to sue generics, only the brand names holding the patent.

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Perhaps Americans SHOULD "consider throwing all your meds in the trash, since Indian and Chinese raw materials and manufacture make up most of the US supply chain." Just because the majority of generics are made in India or China doesn't mean it's okay!! I think if more people knew about what they were putting in their mouths, they'd ask more questions, and demand better drugs. Outrage is normal, or at least it should be, when your very life and health are at stake. BTW, do you work for Mylan? LOL

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I have just finished scrolling back over the Direct Success Pharmacy posts and may have missed something. I thought it was mentioned somewhere that the pharmacy is located in the U.S. AND that the brand Wellbutrin XL that they dispense is also manufactured in the U.S. I called Direct Success pharmacy in Farmingdale, NJ and they told me that the drug in this program that is being mentioned on here is manufactured by Valeant but in Canada and not the U.S. Does this make any difference? Nino? cf? anyone?

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Nope it is the real deal. It was very helpful for me. When it came to the 300XL it was by far my favorite. I have however dropped to (2) Sandoz 150 SR generic which seems to be fine. I only had problems with the generic 300s.

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I've had good success with generic Wellbutrin scripts, but now that I think about it, I probably illegally referred my patients to a local pharmacy where I get my scripts. Known the owner for years. Has the Pharma knows his stuff. He's very successful, because he only stock the best quality (according to Valid and Reliable Research reports) generics He's called me about the best generic Xanax; called one of my buds about Oyxcodone and ended up stocking only ENDOCET, the generic for PERCOCET made by the same company with the same ingredients and on the same pill presses. Sometimes, I forget to specific a manufacturer when I know he's getting the script. I also took Wellbutrin XL generic myself — it was the Sandoz generic, I'm pretty sure and performed true to form. I was under a lot of pressure and my own shrink, the grand old man of psychiatry in my part of this state, asked about Suicidal ideation or gestures. I mentioned that "I'D RATHER DIE THAN than teach "those dumb little entitled mother******s one more day again" (my hospitals are affiliated with big time med schools. I was volunteered to teach Pharmacology 101 because I have a PhD in Pharmacology). WE sat quietly and he said that considering my entire history (he's known me for years; I'm one of these little entitled bastards, only I worked for my entitlements), he wants me to start Wellbutrin. It worked fine, but I became concerned about the seizure risk. We stepped down the dose and replaced it with Prozac and Effexor-XR. I did have an MDE, by the way; you would think for once, he could be wrong! However, the generic did what it's supposed to do. I THINK it was a Sandoz generic.

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Thank you for sharing. I figured I wouldn't be the only one... Pharmacy switched me to Mylan bupropion 150 XL the other day. Horrible side effects: constant undercurrent of anxiety in the pit of my stomach all day, mild to full-blown panic, suicidal ideation, crying, insomnia. Took me all day to realize nothing had changed in my life except new manufacturer of med. Pharmacy said they are phasing out PAR A 101 tablets to these Mylan M B8 pills, but why?? I hate being a pushy customer but can't I ask why? I'm not against a new manufacturer unless it screws up my mental state. I mean, I've gone as needed from brand-name Wellbutrin to Teva to PAR with no noticeable differences. The pharmacy said they'd keep giving me PAR as long as possible, but I need to figure out what to do next. I don't think the Valeant site offers discounted Wellbutrin XR @ 150 mg, as far as I could see...

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This is all Eric's fault, seriously. Those who read and watch the posts everyday and trace them back know it's Eric. Articulate phony working for the other side. You're a very bad man! Now the big BS answer from him. I keep quiet until it hurts everyone's pocket. Mission accomplished!! You and your copay, was it worth all of us? Threw us into the fire.

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Nino: I hate to disappoint you, but I'm just a private consumer with no affiliation to the pharma industry. Are you seriously blaming me for Valeant's sins?

I came to this thread originally to figure out if any particular generic bupropion was better than others. Along the way, I came across Valeant's Patient Assistance Program and I got an intuition that there was something screwy about it. This was confirmed when a member here (cf) discovered Direct Success' phony "co-pay" coming out of his FSA. In July, Direct Success were billing our insurance companies $774 for a 30-day supply of Wellbutrin. That is OUTRAGEOUS, and it most definitely is a scam too. It has since come out that Valeant had a whole network of captive pharmacies like Direct Success.

The main problem with Valeant is that it isn't a traditional pharma corporation i.e. it doesn't do R&D. It makes its money through aggressive acquisitions, and as Congress has now learned, through aggressive billing practices via captive pharmacies like Direct Success. This practice turns out to be widespread in the pharma industry, but Valeant took it to the extreme. Up until September, Valeant was the darling of the hedge funds, but now its stock has fallen by 70% in just a few weeks.

When Valeant bought Wellbutrin from GlaxoSmithKline, they also gained an option to make a generic. You'll notice that they chose not to do this. It made more sense to them to bill hard for the brand product when they could access insured customers.

I have no desire to see brand Wellbutrin disappear from the market, and I doubt that Valeant's problems will make that happen anyway. What I do want is for large drug companies to stop gouging US customers and their insurance companies. My hope is that Congress' new focus on Valeant, Turing and others will result in new legislation that limits the current free-for-all.

I hope that clarifies where I stand.

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If you have commercial insurance, any commercial insurance, you can get Branded Wellbutrin XL with a 0$ co-pay. By the way, I am a rep for Valeant, yes but it doesn't change the fact that it is a 0$ co-pay as of Sunday Nov 8, 2015.
Get it while you can because it may change very soon.

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Neil: $0 co-pay, but almost $800/month to the insurance company. That's almost $10,000 a year, and for a drug that's been out of patent since 1999! I feel sorry for any of your customers who have individual policies, because they are in for a rude shock at the next policy anniversary.

At least Valeant will have you sipping mai tais in Acapulco by then, so you'll be sleeping easy (in your 5-star hotel).

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Peacelilly: I'm sorry to hear about your issues with losing access to Par. Can you switch pharmacies? Many pharmacies will give you Par for the asking. If not, you can always ask your doctor to write something like "Dispense as Par only" on your prescription.

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LM: You think USA manufacturing is "clean"? Let me tell you a story about a little company called Blue Bell Ice-cream. You may have heard of them.

Lysteria was recently detected in Blue Bell's ice-cream, which resulted in the death of three people. The cause was contamination in the plant, and it turned out that all of their plants were contaminated.

In their public apology, management claimed that they "had always acted in the best interests of their consumers." This was an outright lie. Plant employees had been complaining about unsanitary conditions for years, including: melted ice-cream pooling on the floors; roof leaks resulting in flooding; oil, condensation and paint chips dropping into mixing barrels; dirty machinery; re-using cardboard shipping sleeves for 6-7 months. There was so much water in the plant at times that the whole place fogged up and you couldn't see anything! When they repeatedly brought up complaints, these same employees were told to "quit b****ing".

Eight million gallons of ice-cream were destroyed, the plants closed and the company would have gone backrupt if it weren't for a white knight investor a few months ago.

The moral of the story is this: food and drug safety comes from government regulation, which in America means the FDA. It doesn't come from plant operators, no matter where they are in the world.

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Actually, you write the script in this manner:

Rx: Welbutrin XL 150mg - Parr (or a second choice, two, say, Sandoz) tabs #90
Sig: 1 qAM

I think this is a one-size-fits all Rx border becauseI'm specifying which generics I want.Sometimes states permit patients to make the final decision, which is absurd if the prescriber has an ounce of training in pharmacology, etc. I CAN'T write the standard "DAW" or "Medically Necessary" on the script because that leads us back to the original $$$$ brand -name. Hope this helps. TIP: Ask your pharmacist or mail-order pharmacy what your doc needs to do to ensure you get the generic you and I have decided upon.

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" By the way, I am a rep for Valeant, yes but it doesn't change the fact that it is a 0$ co-pay as of Sunday Nov 8, 2015."

It also doesn't change the fact that if you take the "0$ co-pay" then Valeant is going to take $500-$600 per month from your insurance in order for you to "save" $50. When you and your coworkers are bitterly complaining about your insurance premiums going up, you should realize that taking the "0$ co-pay" is stealing money from yourselves.

And then there is the "cadillac tax." The thousands of dollars per year for each of you and your coworkers "saving" a pittance adds up, and if the "value" of your insurance goes up a little bit then the government will make you pay a 40% tax on all of your insurance premiums. I highly doubt that health insurance can survive that.

The "Affordable Care Act" is aptly named. Because once a health insurance is eliminated, you will only get the health care that you, personally, can afford to pay for.

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