“Brown bagging” is a colloquial term describing the practice of patients acquiring pharmaceuticals, such as chemotherapy drugs, through their pharmacy benefit and bringing the drugs to a physician’s office or hospital to have them administered. “Brown bagged” (patient-acquired, physician-administered) drugs are shipped directly from a pharmaceutical wholesaler either to a patient or to an in-network pharmacy where the patient picks up the medication and transports it to
a facility to be administered.
This practice differs from the traditional “buy and bill” arrangement in which providers purchase and stock infused and injectable medications, administer them and
then bill payers for the drugs and their administration under patients’ medical benefits.