Local pharmacies save money while general practitioners are not as virtuous. This is in a nutshell the comment of Albert Fontanesi, president of Federfarma Veneto, to data on pharmaceutical expenditure in the Veneto region in the first quarter of 2014, equal to 151.2 million euros, with a decrease of 4.1% over the same period of 2013. And that's not all. There is also a drop in recipes, in contrast to last year's trend: recipes from January to March 2014 were 10,314,758 in Veneto, with a drop of 1.9% compared to last year, while in 2013 over the whole year (January-December) there was a regional increase of 1.8%. «Once again» declared Fontanesi «local pharmaceutical expenditure is making a substantial contribution to the more general rationalization of healthcare expenditure. However, we would like the sacrifice made by the pharmacies in the area (even recently 2 pharmacies in Venice closed their doors) to be supported by the awareness that the other expenditure items are also following the same virtuous path. I refer» Fontanesi specifies «to the hospital pharmaceutical costs and other general costs, but also to the fact that we do not know that the same "axe" is being used on the prescriptions of sick days by general practitioners. A practice that only apparently does not involve any extra expense, because instead, in reality, in addition to the costs for the employer, absence for health reasons translates into a very high burden given that two thirds of the cost of the days sickness are paid by the community. Therefore, in order to be truly effective and organic, the rationalization of expenditure must involve all subjects and areas of health care," concluded Fontanesi. A direct attack, promptly returned to the sender by the MMGs and by the voice of the Fimmg secretary of Padua Dominic Crisara they spoke of "field invasion" and of "offense". "It's like saying that family doctors favor absenteeism," underlined Crisara. «We have been carrying out electronic certification for two years and therefore the certificate enters a control system».
Marco Malagutti
Wednesday, May 28, 2014 – Pharmacist
