Danger of Unaffordable Drugs

W A S H I N G T O N, July 31 -- Daris Galloway of Austin, Texas, kept a secret from her doctor and her family for several painful weeks.

She needs drugs for a variety of ailments, but when her monthly bill topped $200, she stopped buying the most expensive prescription, which controlled a digestive problem.

"When you get to be 74 and 79 years old, you hate to think that you have to depend on your children to come and buy your medicine for you," Galloway told ABCNEWS, referring to herself and her husband who is 79 years old.

Dr. Ira Wilson, an internist at the Tufts University/New England Medical Center in Boston, says Galloway's situation is not unusual. He suspects that more and more of his elderly patients don't buy medicine he prescribes or they skip doses to make a bottle of pills last longer.

"There is often a don't ask, don't tell policy going on here with doctors and patients, so we often don't know the details unless we ask and persist and try to get good explanations," said Wilson.

A study released today by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Commonwealth Fund, an independent organization that focuses on major health care issues, documents how widespread a practice this is.

Almost one in four of all seniors surveyed said in the past year they didn't fill a prescription or cut back on doses. The number jumps to one in three for seniors who have no insurance and pay for everything out-of-pocket.

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"The cost is prohibitive," said Diane Rowland, the executive vice president of the Kaiser Family Foundation's Health policy program. "One in four seniors report they spend more than $100 a month on their medications and for people living on low and modest incomes that could be a substantial chunk of their monthly salary."

Sufferers of Life-Threatening Illnesses Even Skip

One of the more alarming findings in the study is how frequently people skip medications even when they have life-threatening illnesses such as diabetes or heart disease.