SUPPLY shortages of generic brands of vital chronic medications are forcing pharmacists to "hunt and forage" for alternatives, while leaving patients out of pocket paying brand price premiums on orginators.
Pharmacy Guild of Australia Victorian Branch President, Anthony Tassone, told Pharmacy Daily supply shortages have seen patients prescribed anti-hypertensive, candesartan, and anti-depressant, sertraline, hit with brand price premiums of $13.35 and $5.51 respectively.
"These are regular long term medications for chronic conditions that patients can't go without," he said.
"The Guild continues to be an active participant on a medication shortage working group hosted by the Therapeutic Goods Administration with other stakeholders to collaborate to best manage medicine supply challenges.
"Whilst there can be a number of issues that contribute to medication shortages -- it has sadly long been a daily exercise for community pharmacists to 'hunt and forage' for stock on behalf of their patients that is in short supply.
"Nothing changes if nothing changes, and we must explore other ways to manage this potentially serious issue so that patients don't risk going without.
"This could include a supply guarantee on manufacturers to apply to all PBS listed medicines (not just originator and first generic brands), greater clarity on what constitutes a 'critical' shortage which places greater obligations on manufacturers to report a supply issue within certain time frames, wider scope of medication substitutions for pharmacists, and also ways that the brand price premiums can be waived for patients where there are wide spread generic shortages at no cost to the community pharmacy.
Community pharmacies have done a brilliant job in helping manage medication shortages for their patients throughout the COVID pandemic, but the ongoing shortages go deeper than this pandemic event and pharmacists are consumed spending precious time managing stock issues that could be better spent with patients delivering care and advice."
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