For those of us lucky enough to have insurance coverage for medication costs, we assume that no matter what our co-pay, we must be saving money over the “actual” cost of the medications. But it turns out that may not be a correct assumption. Reporter Susan Jaffe, in a post from Kaiser Health News, recently reported on the phenomenon of pharmacist gag rules, which prohibit pharmacists from revealing to patients what the cash cost of a medication is unless the patient asks. In fact, seniors on Medicare may be able to get quite a few dollars in savings if they ask their pharmacist for the cash price of their medications, rather than the Medicare co-pay they usually pay. In a recent letter in JAMA, researchers found that the co-pay can be higher than the cash price nearly 25% of the time. So next time you’re at the pharmacy, don’t be afraid to speak up. And for more ideas about saving money on your medications, take a look at this Consumer Reports piece.