TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — U.S. hospitals are coping better with ongoing shortages of hundreds of medications, but a new survey indicates that obtaining drugs from alternate sources is costing them a lot of money they can’t spare.

Premier Inc., the hospital group that did the survey, conservatively estimates that cost at $230 million a year for the country’s 5,000 hospitals, on average, from 2011 through 2013.