Pharmacy and Prescriptions in Valencia: SIP, Costs, Cover

Ask your doctor for the treatment, then show your SIP card at a pharmacy with the treatment sheet or the app. The electronic prescription does not expire before the planned end of treatment. You pay a share of the price set by income band, 40% for active insured persons with income under €18,000, rising with income above that.

Need a refill? Show your SIP card at any pharmacy in the Comunitat Valenciana, with your treatment sheet or the APP + Salut on your phone. You then pay a share of the price that depends on your income.

How do you get a refill?

Ask your doctor for the treatment first. The electronic prescription lasts until the end of the treatment your doctor planned, so it will not expire on you halfway. The SIP card guide and the GP registration guide cover getting the card and a doctor.

At the pharmacy, identify yourself with the SIP card and your treatment code, or with your DNI. You do not have to collect everything shown as available: take what you need now and the rest stays there until the treatment ends. You pay your share at the counter. On a chronic treatment, go back as each box runs out.

The virtual SIP card in the GVA+Salut app gives you a code to collect without the physical card, which is handy if you leave the card at home.

How much do you pay?

Active insured persons with income under €18,000, and their beneficiaries, pay 40% of the price. Higher incomes pay more: 45% from €18,000, 50% from €60,000 and 60% from €100,000, measured on the taxable base of your income tax return. Social Security pensioners pay 10%, or 60% with income of €100,000 or more.

Medicines in the reduced-contribution groups cost 10% of the price, up to €4.98. Foreign nationals not registered as residents pay 40%. The SIP card guide explains the route if you have no residence papers yet.

Monthly caps apply to all pensioners and to active insured persons earning under €35,000: for active insured persons €8.23 under €9,000, €18.52 from €9,000 and €61.75 from €18,000, and for pensioners from €8.23 to €61.75 by income. Anything above your cap is refunded by the region at least every six months.

Some people pay nothing: those who have lost unemployment benefit, people on non-contributory pensions, ingreso mínimo vital recipients, and treatments from a work accident or occupational disease.

Pensioners, unemployed people and single-parent families can also get extra help from the Conselleria on publicly funded treatments bought at an authorised Valencian pharmacy. You can check your position online with an SMS code or a digital certificate. To get one, see the digital certificate guide.

What about a prescription from home?

Your European Health Insurance Card will not work at the pharmacy counter. If you live in Valencia, get your prescription through your doctor instead. The private insurance guide and the public vs private comparison explain how cover changes who prescribes.

Which pharmacy is open tonight?

Use the finder on the MICOF homepage, “Buscar farmacias de urgencia y abiertas”. For Valencia city the same block lists 900 500 952. The emergency numbers guide covers when a pharmacy is not enough.

Common snags

• Collecting in another region. Your health card works there, under that region’s dispensing rules.
• Medicine not yet available. Return to your health centre for a new prescription.

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Not confirmed: Whether the Conselleria co-payment aid page is valid this year: it is undated and shows no amounts. Which countries' prescriptions a Valencian pharmacy accepts: no country list is published with the rule. Ask the pharmacist before you rely on either.

General information checked against the sources listed above. Prices, opening hours and other details change; confirm them with the provider before you act. See how guides are checked.

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