Quetiapine 29pcs, allopurinol 4, seroquel 8, triptych 6, tachidol 7. It is not an order from a pharmacy to its wholesaler, but the leftover packages of a supply for several months of therapy, dispensed in direct distribution to an over 90-year-old from the province of Modena who died in recent days. The relatives, not knowing what to do with it, put everything in a box and turned to the pharmacy near the house. The owner obviously didn't take them, but he took some photos to testify to the waste. Waste of medicines that could have gone to other patients and waste of public money - the one spent to buy them - of which no trace remains, because the Regions are quick to magnify theI save from direct distribution but they don't keep the slightest account of these leftovers.
Yet it is known that the supplies of direct distribution are more massive (in Romagna drugs are delivered in a single step even for six months of therapy) and the higher the risk of waste: the patient's death is one of the least frequent eventualities, the case of packages left halfway and then thrown away when the new supply arrives from the ASL, pills confused with each other because with all those boxes the elderly lose their bearings, products changed during therapy due to unwanted reactions or other (with the old ones thrown in the bin). «A customer supplied by the ASL in direct distribution» explains to Filodiretto the pharmacist who released the photos «he told me how deliveries to the Local Health Authority work: every time the same number of cans indicated on the Treatment plan, and if he says "no I don't want these because I still have some at home” they still give them to them, because only bureaucracy applies there. In the pharmacy these things would not happen, because we dispense one pack at a time».
Let's not talk about the support for therapies. «Some time ago» the pharmacist continues «an elderly man entered the pharmacy with a bag full of strips, lancing needles and glucometers. The ASL had supplied them directly to him, but no one had explained how to use them. I had to do it, even if it wouldn't be right: we are already suffering from the unfair competition of direct distribution, because patients don't pay the co-payment for medicines dispensed by the ASL; then we also have to compensate for the inadequacies of the NHS ». And this also leads to waste: the patient who is not trained to use the device correctly is treated badly or worse, gets tired and does not use it.
It is for this reason that, yesterday, the private pharmacies of Emilia Romagna they went on strike for half a day, against an illogical and penalizing direct distribution. And the balance of the "day after" is positive: the 90% of the exercises took part in the lockout, reports in a regional Federfarma note, including the exercises on duty that expressed their support with a poster bearing the inscription "This pharmacy adheres to the protest but it remains open for shifts». Alongside the owners also the municipal pharmacies of the region, which closed the Cup for half a day of agitation, and the employees of the municipalized Ravenna Farmacie, which in a press release they declared that they wanted to join the protest to denounce "the lack of attention of the Region and the Local Health Authorities towards local pharmacies" and "the inconvenience created for citizens by direct distribution". The only voice out of the Federfarma chorus is the Parma owners' association, which did not participate in the lockout.
«We are particularly satisfied with the very high adhesion» is the comment of the president of Federfarma Emilia Romagna, Domenico Dal Re «it means that the category is united when it comes to defending a constitutional right of the citizen and the very role of the pharmacy. Ours is a battle of principle, we defend the role of the pharmacy as an integral part of the national health system. It has never been and never will be an economic issue, but a social battle to bring medicines back to citizens. We are the region that saw the birth of the pharmacy of services, it is time for Emilia Romagna to return to being a "model": for this reason we are ready to open any table that assumes respect for citizens, especially those in the most weak of the population".
Related news: Direct distribution, case breaks out on social media: the complaint of Emilian pharmacists
