Baraclude (Entecavir) 1 mg tablet - OK to Cut in Half?

[Wayne1688]

Hi everyone, Does anyone happen to know for fact if Baraclude 1 mg can be cut in half to yield a dose of 0.5 mg?   This is so that the 1 mg tablet can be used for 2 days of 0.5 mg daily treatment. It is very expensive, and someone has recommended doing so for cost savings.  A phone call to the BMS company did NOT help.  The company is pretty tight lipped.  Any info or reference source is appreciated.  Thanks in advance.

[studyforhope]

The pills are made of a powder mix of the drug and a volumizing substance and flow enhancers and stickiness after compression enhancers by mechanical compression. If there would be inconsistency inside the pill, there would also be inconsistency from pill to pill. Thus cutting in half will give you half of the content.

[calmama]

BMS, the company that made Baraclude (brand name etv), will help pay UP TO $200 (us dollars) of your Baraclude co-pay until Dec. 31, 2014.  Here is the link:
http://www.baraclude.com/copay-benefit-program.aspx

I don't know if this will really help you, but I thought I would post it anyway.

[stef2011]

those cutting brand tdf and etv in two are exposed to resistance and treatment failure because active ingredient is not homogeneous in the pills, so even if you cut pill perfectly in half you won t get half dose active ingredient

[stef2011]

only some generic versions of entecavir or tenofovir may be splitted

brand tdf and etv are made so that you can t cut in half and they can have maximum profit from you