Vol. 7, Issue 7 (2018)

Author(s):
Shipra Omar and Sneha Sharma

Abstract:
Calcium supplements are commonest kind of drugs among all medication as they are used to treat many diseased conditions. The financial burden of supplements were around one fifty billion dollars in year 2009. The main aim of the study was to perform a pharmacoeconomics survey and analyze the cost minimization analysis of calcium supplement drugs having same efficacy but differ in their brand name and cost. A total number of 150 prescriptions were reviewed and followed up at the outpatient department and pharmacy of a memorial hospital. Where the most commonly prescribed drugs were Shelcal, Ambrocal, Supracal, Cipcal, Telcal, and Dailycal. Among which shelcal was found to be the costliest (190 rupees) and most prescribed (32.66%) drug among all. Whereas the cheapest drug with same efficacy was dailycal (39 rupees) and was prescribed to only 7.33% patients only. Cost minimization analysis shows that among all six medications the most prescribed drugs were three times costlier than least prescribed drugs. Which would be increasing the per prescription cost burden leading to loose in medical adherence of these drugs. It is the fact that drugs with same efficacy and same generic formula will ultimately produce same effect. So the study concluded that, the cheaper drugs should be prescribed to patients rather than the costlier drugs and it should be the duty of health care professionals to consider the pharmacoeconomics value of drugs while prescribing the drugs.