According to estimates proposed by an American researcher from St. Michael's Hospital, there is ample room for saving taxpayers millions of dollars spent on the purchase of prescribed drugs at the end of hospitalization. And the solution is to focus on medicines that cost less. The reference scenario is Canada, where, according to Chaim Bell, author of the report published in the journal PLoS One, health care expenditures have risen rapidly reaching 191 billion dollars in 2010 and approximately 16% is represented by drugs. He noticed that! some classes of drugs account for the majority of these expenses, for example the annual cost of ACE inhibitors has doubled in 10 years to $956 million. Bell assessed, in particular, how much public money could be saved if hospitals prescribe the cheapest when they start patients on a new treatment and discharge them. It identified three drugs that are commonly prescribed and account for a large share of prescription drug costs in Canada: proton pump inhibitors, ACE inhibitors and angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs). In Ontario, for example, $2.48 million, $968,000 and $325,000 were spent on these three therapies for one year, respectively. By substituting the least expensive version of each specialty, savings could be made after patient discharge from the hospital during the year on 47, 17 and 4%, respectively. "At a time when every dollar spent on health matters" is Bell's comment "and must be spent wisely, hospitals and institutions should study ways to break down the barriers around prescribing, purchase and distribution of drugs".
July 2, 2012 – DoctorNews
Nerina Dirindin
How to save 200 million with just one drug
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