As I’ve mentioned before, I am a nasal allergy sufferer. Without my meds, I get sinus headaches, stuffy nose, and on worse days, runny nose, sneezing, and really bad headaches. I take rhinocort, which is a prescription medicine that runs $25 for about a month’s supply. I also take Alavert D-12, a 12-hour medicine which combines loratadine, the active ingredient in Claritin, and pseudoephedrine, the active ingredient in Sudafed. Loratadine controls most allergy symptoms, while pseudoephedrine controls sinus congestion.

Alavert D-12 runs $15.99 for a 24-dose pack, or $0.67 per dose. Each dose has the equivalent day of two 30mg Sudafed tablets and one 5mg Loratadine tablet. For a while, I thought this was the best deal I could get, combining two medicines I needed into one pill. That is, until my last doctor’s appointment, where I found out that I could get generic pseudoephedrine and generic loratadine for much cheaper than even the cheapest store brands, at the medical center’s in-house pharmacy. How much cheaper?

Well, today I picked up a bottle of 100 “SudoGest” tablets, equivalent to Sudafed, for $1.77. Yep. Not a typo. One dollar and seventy-seven cents. That works out to $0.02 per pill. Compare that to name-brand Sudafed, which, at best is $7.99 for a 48 pill pack or $0.17 per pill. Even Walgreens’ store brand, Wal-phed, is at best $8.99 for a 96 pill pack, or $0.09 per pill. Dag, yo! And I picked up two boxes of generic 24-hour loratadine, $4.99 for each 30-pill pack, or $0.16 per pill. Compare that to name-brand Claritin, 30 pills for $23.99 or $0.79 each, or Walgreens’ brand Wal-itin, 90 pills for $19.99 or $0.22 per pill. Boo-yah! In addition to the price advantage, separating the two medicines means that I can take the allergy medicine every day, and then take the nasal congestion medicine only when I need it.

Is it sad that I get so excited about things like this?