Pharmacy Daily | Naturals could ease health

COMPLEMENTARY medicines could potentially save millions of dollars in healthcare costs without compromising patient health, according to the University of Western Sydney. The statement comes on the back of research conducted by Access Economics for the National Institute of Complementary Medicine at the UWS, which examined the cost effectiveness of selected complementary medicines (incl. St John’s work, fish oil, acupuncture and herbal antiinflammatories) used to treat common ailments including, back pain, heart disease, arthritis and depression. “The clinical evidence showing some complementary medicine can play a vital role in improving an individual’s health has been clear for some time, now this report shows complementary medicine could also improve the health of the healthcare system,” said Professor Bensoussan, Director of the Centre for Complementary Medicine Research at UWS. However despite the “substantial dollar savings” clocked for complementary medicines in the report, only direct healthcare costs were noted, with indirect costs such as loss of productivity excluded from its scope. “The economic benefits of complementary medicine would be much larger than we report if the significant flow-on benefits of keeping people healthy, able to work and out of an already over stretched hospital system were included,” said Lynne Pezzullo, Director of Access Economics. The report took into account clinical trials which found that St John’s wort was just as effective in treating mild to moderate depression as some pharmaceutical antidepressants, and surmised that a simple substitution could potentially save “nearly $50 million a year”, whilst taking fish oil supplements was a “highly cost effective intervention to prevent heart disease for those who had already had a myocardial infarction (heart attack)”. The report also surmised that acupuncture as a complement to standard care for lower back pain is “very cost effective” and that based on prior efficacy studies, the herbal preparation Phytodolor used in the treatment of osteoarthritis could save Australians $178m a year if taken in place of nonsteroidal anti inflammatory drugs.

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