ABSTRACT
Background: In developing countries like Ethiopia one-third of health care expenditure is for medications. However, due to different reasons, patients may not use all the dispensed medications. Thus, the present study aimed to assess the Causes and cost of unused medications at the inpatient setting of the University of Gondar Compressive Specialized Hospital. Methods: A hospital-based cross-sectional study was conducted over two months at University of Gondar Compressive Specialized Hospital. A survey of the Causes and cost of unused medicines was conducted through an interview-guided structured questionnaire in the inpatient setting. Those patients who had unused/leftover medications in the inpatient setting during the study period were the target population. All opened liquid preparations such as vials, ampoules, and bags were excluded from the study since it is tough to calculate the amount leftover/remaining. The collected data were entered with Epi Data version 3.1 and exported to SPSS version 21 for analysis. Descriptive statistics such as standard deviation, percentage, frequency, mean, and median were used for data presentation. Finally, the results were described using texts, tables, and figures. Results: A total of 13 classes of medication were identified during the study period. Among these, antibiotics 74(35.23%) were the most common leftover class of medications with the financial value of 143.48$(25.10%) of total leftover/unused medication. The most common reasons for medication leftover or unused were because of condition resolved 51(24.28%) followed by treatment changed 50(23.8%). Most 86(40.95%) of leftover/unused medication with a monetary value of 5106.80 Ethiopian birr (127.65 USD) was discarded by the patient. About 66(31.43%) of the patients were taken their leftover medication to home for other programs or feature use, 13.80% of patients gave their leftover medications to other patients. More than half 160(76.19%) of unused medications were eligible for use with the monetary value of 17,992.85 (78.7%) Ethiopian birr. Conclusions: Significant amounts of the hospitals’ budget were wasted because of unused/leftover medications and have a serious cost impact. Antibiotics were most frequently class of medication leftover/unused and the condition resolved and treatment changed were the two main reasons for medication leftover/unused. Most of the leftover medications were discarded by the patient, only a very limited number of patients/caregivers plan to return their leftover medications to the pharmacy.
ABSTRACT
Corona virus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a kind of viral pneumonia with an unusual outbreak in Wuhan, China, in December 2019, which is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Since the outbreak of corona virus disease 2019 (COVID-19), many researchers in the world have immediately carried out clinical research scheme of the COVID-19. Vaccines are being rapidly developed but will likely come too late to have an impact on the first wave of a potential pandemic. It highlights antiviral strategies involving small molecules and biologics targeting complex molecular interactions involved in coronavirus infection and replication. The drugrepurposing effort documented herein focuses primarily on agents known to be effective against other RNA viruses including SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV. The patent analysis of coronavirus related biologics includes therapeutic antibodies, Anti-inflammatory agents, and nucleic acid-based therapies targeting virus gene expression as well as various types of vaccines. Many patents disclose methodologies of these biologics with the potential for treating and preventing coronavirus infections, which may be applicable to COVID-19. But, there is still a lack of a review on therapeutic agents and vaccines for COVID-19. Therefore, this review summarizes studies which are ongoing development of therapeutic agents and vaccines.