Catherine was getting nervous about her ADHD prescription. In 2022, the 29-year-old New Yorker had started using Done, a direct-to-consumer telehealth company that treats attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. The medication her provider had prescribed, a stimulant called Vyvanse, was helping her manage distraction so severe that she frequently had car accidents.
But online, she had started reading about other telehealth patients running into problems getting their ADHD medications. Increasingly, big box pharmacies were cracking down on prescriptions from online-only providers like Done and Cerebral as their practices faced intense scrutiny. And she heard that, when the Covid-19 public health emergency eventually ended, she likely wouldn’t be able to get her medication without meeting a provider in-person.
“With the whole pandemic thing ending and restrictions happening, it was like, ‘I need to be seeing an actual psychiatrist so I don’t have my access to this cut off,’” said Catherine, who asked to be referred to by her first name only.
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