Over-the-counter drug prices can be a major headache — but if you’re looking in the right place, they don’t have to be.
Grant Harting, a licensed pharmacist in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Virginia, says there are plenty of medications worth buying for just $1.25 at Dollar Tree, and he’s highlighted some of the best bargains — and the ones not even worth the buck and a quarter — on TikTok.
Pharmaceutical companies spend billions of dollars each year advertising their brand-name drugs, but generic versions are made with the exact same active ingredients.
“Brand-name medications are not always better. Many of them are highly expensive,” Dr. Niteesh K. Choudhry, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, told Harvard Health Publishing.
Grant, who had dedicated his TikTok to educating people about affordable medications, visited a Pittsburgh Dollar Tree to break down which items he think are of good value.
Numb the pain
The best product of all, he said, is the store’s Iodent Maximum Strength Oral Analgesic Gel, which is made with benzocaine to numb cuts and sores in your mouth. Similar products are sold by brands like Orajel and Kanka, with typical prices online ranging between $7 and $12.
“A dollar twenty-five and you get almost an entire ounce,” he raved. “This is almost a lifetime supply. This is seriously, like, ten, eleven dollars at the other pharmacy. This is the best product that Dollar Tree has. I use this myself. I love it, I love it, I love it.”
Cream of the crop
Generally, he added, the best value you’ll find are creams, and he’s a fan of Dollar Tree’s CareAll brand arthritis and muscle pain relief cream. Its active ingredient is .025% capsaicin, which he estimates costs $6 to $8 anywhere else.
Another “great deal” is the CareAll brand anti-itch cream, which is made with diphenhydramine, the same active ingredient in Benadryl. It’s marketed as itch and pain relief for things like bug bites, poison ivy, and sunburn.
A nearly identical product is sold at CVS for $5.99, while Benadryl’s version with a similar formulation costs $7.79 at the major drugstore chain.
Pain relief
While gels and creams are his favorite buys, he also recommends Dollar Tree’s Valuhealth Pain Relief PM, which comes in a pack of 24 caplets. The active ingredients are the acetaminophen, the pain reliever in Tylenol, plus a nighttime sleep aid.
The same size bottle of Tylenol PM sells for $7.79 at CVS.
Finally, the pharmacist’s also a “big fan” of cough syrups like Dollar Tree’s Assured Tussin Cough & Chest Congestion DM Cough Syrup, noting that they’re the perfect size.
Don’t bother, shoppers
But not everything is gets his stamp of approval. He warned that their hemorrhoid cream isn’t a great deal at all, because similar creams are often quite cheap at other stores. He also encourages skipping their children’s allergy relief liquid, which he compared to Benadryl.
Finally, in the supplement category, he cautioned that the $1.25 melatonin is neither a good deal — nor does he thing the 3 mg dosage is effective, suggesting people should take at least 5 mg.
The Cleveland Clinic recommends starting at just 1 mg and increasing dosage one milligram at a time, up to 10 mg.
