RESUMO
Background: Diabetes is one of the most common non-communicable disease worldwide, of which India has been crowned with the title of “diabetes capital of the world”. On an average a person spends 20% of his or her income for the treatment of diabetes per year. So, it’s become very important to conduct a complete cost disparity study among oral hypoglycemic agent available in the market. Information generated from the current analysis, will be helpful to doctors in choosing the right drug for their patient and for the health sector in successfully utilizing the available resources.Methods: The study was conducted in the department of pharmacology AIIMS, Patna 2019. Price of the drugs per tablet/capsule/vial were reviewed from “Current Index of Medical Specialties” January-April 2019 and “Drug Today” October-December, 2018 for analysis of different formulations of oral hypoglycemic agents.Results: The cost of total 16 drugs belonging to 6 different classes, available in 38 different formulations were analyzed. Total 44 different pharmaceutical companies were involved in the manufacture of oral hypoglycemic agents. Overall glibenclamide (5 mg) and bromocriptine (2.5 mg) showed maximum % price variation of 422.79 and 586.27 respectively. Dapagliflozin and canagliflozin both belonging to sodium glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors shows minimum price variation of 9.86 and 0.9 respectively.Conclusions: The current study shows that there is a huge price variation among oral hypoglycemic agents manufactured by different companies and government needs to take essential steps to bring about the uniformity in the price.
RESUMO
Background: The study was performed to analyze the extent of price variation amongst branded antihypertensive drugs in India and the relation of this price variation to number of pharmaceutical companies manufacturing/marketing these drugs. Methods: Price of different brands of antihypertensive drugs was collected from authentic sources. The data were segregated and the percentage price variation was calculated applying suitable statistical tools. Results: A total of 116 formulations from different companies representing 38 antihypertensive drugs were analyzed. Maximum price variation (3233.33%) was seen with 10 mg dose of propranolol. In general the price variations are proportionally correlated to the number of pharmaceutical companies. Conclusions: Price variation of great extent was found among many formulations. Physicians should be aware of these variations for choosing the appropriate brand for rational therapeutics. This will reduce the burden on patients and family.