Step therapy
The vocabulary of getting a claim paid, of FDA enforcement, and of what on-label and off-label really mean.
What is Step therapy?
The insurer requiring you to fail a cheaper or older drug first.
For GLP-1s that usually means Contrave or Qsymia before Wegovy or Zepbound. It is a legitimate cost-control tool and, in practice, one of the biggest access barriers in the class.
Related reading: How to Get a GLP-1 Covered by Insurance
GLP Watchdog writes these definitions from FDA labels and peer-reviewed PubMed literature.
Where Step therapy comes up on this site
On GLP Watchdog, Step therapy comes up in 1 research article.
Research that discusses it
Drug pages
Other terms under Insurance and regulatory
Where the evidence lives
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