Hi Barb,

Good luck making your decision about Gilenya. Here is some useful information about the drug and the assistance program. I'm like you--trying to decide if I should try it now or wait it out and see how people do with it.

http://mscare.org/cmsc/Informs-Novar...-Programs.html

The assistance program by Novartis is not based on income--mostly you just have to have commercial health insurance and not be on Medicaid/Medicare.

Here is what I picked out of the link above.

# The Gilenya Prescription Co-Pay Support Program, which will cover a significant portion of prescription out-of-pocket costs for eligible patients with commercial health insurance.*
# The Gilenya Medical Co-Pay Support Program, which will reduce the out-of pocket costs associated with Gilenya initiation for eligible patients who require certain tests before starting treatment.**

*Government program beneficiaries and residents of Massachusetts are excluded.
**Government program beneficiaries and residents of Massachusetts, Michigan, Rhode Island and Minnesota are excluded by law and are not eligible.

I just read on some blogs that Gilenya is paying everyones co-pays until 12/31/11. So that's a year+ of free meds.

If you move to Austin (Texas I assume?) I've heard this MS specialist is the guy to see. He is in a suburb of Austin.

http://austin.citysearch.com/profile...is_clinic.html