Prescriptions can only be filled at a Pharmacy, which registers your insurance details, provides you with usage instructions and informs you about possible side effects and check for possible interactions with other medication you may be taking at that moment.
Pharmacies are open during office hours, and will provide information saying which Pharmacy is on after-hour duty. You usually register with a Pharmacy in your area and inform your GP about it. If you have an in-kind Insurance Policy, you should register with a Pharmacy that is contracted by your Health Insurance Provider.
When your GP (or medical specialist) has given out a prescription, you can take this to your Pharmacy. If your GP has registered the name of your Pharmacy, the prescription will in most cases be sent electronically to your Pharmacy.
If it concerns chronic medication, you can usually request your GP for a repeated prescription, either online or by leaving a message on the answering machine.
You can pick up your medication at your Pharmacy, but in some specific cases you can request for it to be delivered to you free of charge,
You may not always get exactly what was prescribed, but a variant with the same active ingredient(s).
Health Insurers have the possibility to reimburse only certain variants (e.g. on the basis of their pricing or price agreements between Health Insurer and Pharmaceutical Manufacturer) in a number of medicinal products. This is called Preference Policy. If your Health Insurer carries out a Preference Policy for one or more resources, it is in your Insurance Policy.
If a medical necessity requires to apply a more expensive variant of the drug, your Health Insurer may deviate from the Preference Policy. The way in which Health Insurers implement the preferential policy varies from one Health Insurer to the other. For more information, please consult your Insurance Policy or Pharmacy.