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Background: Medicines play a main role in the process of human development. The rational utilization of medicines can decrease morbidity and mortality as well as improve quality of life. In an era of steeply rising health care expenses, generic medicines provide a less expensive alternative to branded medicines. Use of generic drugs can contribute to substantial savings in medicines expenditure and the issue of access and affordability is thus addressed.Methods: A sample of 500 patients selected from out patient department was randomly selected. A self-instructed questionnaire was used for the study for the duration of 1 month. Data was analyzed using IBM SPSS statistics Version 20 New York, United States. Summary statistics were expressed using mean and standard deviation (SD) for numerical variables (median and interquartile ranges [IQRs] when skewed) and counts and percentages for categorical variables.Results: Participants reported with 17.23% knowledge score, 40.65% attitude score, and 7.96% attitude score.Conclusions: In the study it was found that there is significant correlation between knowledge and attitude whereas no correlation was found between knowledge and practice regarding usage of generic drugs.
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Background: There is much debate regarding the importance of promoting the use of cheaper generic alternatives over brand-name drugs. While generic drugs have been noted to be comparable to brand-name drugs in their ability to treat conditions, significant debate surrounding their bioavailability or the concentration of the drug that reaches its site of action has arisen. Many experts continue to believe that generic and brand-name drugs are bioequivalent and equally viable options for effective drug treatment, as assumed in this review.Methods: Prices of commonly used branded and generic medicines in same concentration, dosage form and combination were compared with the help of Indian Drug Review, brochures of pharmaceuticals and pharmacies and Jan Aushadhi price list 2017. Mean of all the prices available of branded and generic medicine were calculated and the percentage difference in the mean costs of generic and branded medicines were calculated.Results: The mean cost of 47 branded medicines out of the selected 50 medicines was higher than their generic versions. Mean cost of 3 generic medicines was higher than branded ones. Percentage difference in the mean costs of branded and generic medicines varied from <10% to >70%.Conclusions: This study has shown a very noteworthy difference of prices between branded and generic drugs. Efforts should be taken to promote the generic medication. Misconception about low efficacy with generic drugs should be erased.
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Background: The aim was to study the prescribing patterns of clinicians working in two different settings i.e. Teaching clinicians (clinicians working in teaching hospital) and Non-teaching clinicians (clinicians involved only in private practice).Methods: A comparative cross sectional study was carried out for a period of 6 months in two settings. The study is confined to teaching clinicians comprising of qualified medical practitioners in ACSR Government Medical College (ACSR GMC) and Non-teaching clinicians of qualified medical practitioners in private health sector (PMPs). 450 prescriptions were collected from clinicians belonging to various departments of ACSR GMC and 450 prescriptions from private practitioners of Nellore city. Data was coded and entered in MS Excel. Data was analyzed on EPI INFO version 3.5.4.Results: In this study it was found that teaching clinicians prescribed 146 (12.85%) drugs by generic name, whereas non-teaching clinicians prescribed 112 (8.75%) drugs by generic name.Conclusions: The findings of the present study indicate that the drugs prescribed by the generic names were remarkably less in both teaching and non teaching clinicians. This indicates a need for improving the generic prescribing patterns in both the settings.
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Background: Worldwide, Hypertension is estimated to cause 7.5 million deaths, about 12.8% of the total of all deaths. This accounts for 57 million disability adjusted life years (DALYS) or 3.7% of total DALYS. Globally, the overall prevalence of hypertension in adults aged 25 and over was around 40% in 2008.Despite its benefits, treatment of hypertension is costly. Direct medical spending to treat hypertension totalled $42.9 billion in 2010, with almost half ($20.4 billion) in the form of prescription medications. Being, a silent disease, adherence to antihypertensive drugs is poor. One of the important factors of poor adherence to antihypertensives is the cost of the drugs. There is wide cost variation among different brands of the same antihypertensive drug. Clinician’s awareness of cost of therapeutics is poor. The costly brand of same generic drug is proved to be in no way superior to its economically cheaper counterpart.Methods: The minimum and the maximum cost in Rupees (INR) of a particular antihypertensive agent manufactured by various pharmaceutical companies in the same strength were noted. The cost of 10 tablets/capsules was calculated. The cost ratio and percent cost variation were calculated for each brand.Results: The cost variation observed in the present study was as high as 2337.50 % for Hydralazine. Other significantly high cost variations found in the present study were: 1315.25% (Telmisartan+Hydrochlorthiazide), 870.58% (Amlopdipine), 558.34% (Amlodipine+Atenolol), 537.68% (Valsartan), 394.44% (Metoprolol), 344.44% (Enalapril), 316.22% (Propranolol), 300% (Lisinopril), 290.90% (Carvedilol), 289% (Cilnidipine), 271.99% ( Labetolol), 268.04% (Indapamide), 256.31% (Losartan), 255.19% (Irbesartan), 226% (Methyldopa), 223.04% (Frusemide), 209.78% (Nitrendepine), 192.08% (Terazosin), 189.25% (Atenolol), 142.42% (Bisoprolol) and 120.51% (Felodipine).Conclusions: Financial constraints are a reality in almost all aspects of medicine. Doctors must consider drug costs to their patients. Increasing pharmaceutical costs negatively impacts patients. Given the increasing healthcare costs, there is growing interest in rational prescribing, which takes costs of medication into account.
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Objective To compare the efficacy and safety between Chinese generic imatinib (Xinwei(R),Jiansu Hansoh Pharmaceutical Group Co.,Ltd.) versus branded imatinib (Glivec(R),Novartis) in patients with newly-diagnosed chronic myeloid leukemia in chronic phase (CML-CP).Methods Patients with newly diagnosed CML-CP were enrolled and assigned to receive either Xinwei or Glivec at an initial dose of 400 mg/d according to patients' financial capability.The efficacy and adverse effects were evaluated.Results From January 2014 to September 2015,145 eligible patients were assigned to Xinwei (n =89) or Glivec (n =56) group.All patients were treated and followed up at least 3 months.At 3 months,the complete response rates were 95.5％ (85/89) and 100％ (56/56),major cytogenetic response rates were 74.2％ (66/89) and 80.4％ (45/56),and the proportions of achieving BCR-ALBIS ≤ 10％ were 76.1％ (67/88) and 82.1％ (46/56) in Xinwei and Glivec groups respectively (all P ＞0.05).With a median follow-up of 12 months,2 patients in each group progressed to accelerate or blast phase.Hematologic and non-hematologic side effects were similar between the 2 groups.Conclusions Early hematological,cytogenetic and molecular responses between Xinwei and Glivec are comparable in newly-diagnosed CML-CP patients.The progression rate and side effects are also similar between the 2 groups.
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Background: Ischemic heart disease is the most common cardiovascular disease in developed countries such as United States and Angina pectoris is the most frequent among them. If not managed adequately angina results in significant morbidity and mortality too due to the complications. Antianginal therapy is lifelong. Therefore, analysis of the price of drugs used in ischemic heart disease will help to improve patient compliance. Methods: Prices of various antianginal drugs of different strengths and combinations marketed by different companies was obtained from current index of medical stores. The variation between highest and lowest price of the same medication manufactured by various pharma companies and percentage variation in price for ten tablets was calculated. Results: In India, percentage variation in price for antianginal drugs was found to be: tablet isosorbide dinitrate (5 mg) 250%, glyceryltrinitrate (6.4 mg) 24.44%. In calcium channel blockers group, tablet amlodipine 10 mg shows maximum price variation of 1045%, closely followed by 5 mg of amlodipine with a variation of 1040%, while 120 mg of diltiazem shows the least variation of 262%. In betaadrenergic receptor blockers group, tablet atenolol 50 mg shows maximum price variation of 563%, whereas 100 mg of extended release metoprolol shows the least variation of 42%. Conclusions: To increase the benefit to the patient and reduce drug in compliance, doctors should be trained to be familiar from internship period itself about the brand names of cost-effective drugs with good safety profile for a long period.
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Objective of the study was to perform a cost minimization analysis of antibiotic prescriptions in pediatric cases.This was a prospective observational study conducted in the pediatric department of a teaching hospital. A total of 209 prescriptions, of both outpatients and inpatients, containing antibiotics were analyzed. Top five of the commonly prescribed antibiotics in this study were chosen as examples to illustrate the cost difference between the branded and generic versions. This study has shown a very significant difference of prices between branded and generic drugs. The cost of branded drugs prescribed was 20% to 218% more than the generic versions.