(Nicola Simonetti with the collaboration of Donatella Tansella) Big problems occurred for pharmacies. Those hospitals find it increasingly difficult to manage the distribution of medicines correctly and orderly. Besides 300 free pharmacies are likely to no longer be supported by a company with the risk of losing, in one fell swoop, 1.500 jobs.
FREE PHARMACIES
An open letter was sent by Hippocrates Holding, Admenta Italia - LloydsFarmacia and Dr. Max, (representing over 300 pharmacies in Italy) to the President of the Council of Ministers and the two to the Vice Presidents, regarding the sub-amendment to the Budget Law which provides the closure of pharmacies that are not owned by at least 51% of registered pharmacists.
“The sub-amendment - say the authors of the letter - would constitute a fundamental step backwards with respect to the evolution of the free pharmacy sector, creating at the same time a serious uncertainty in the regulatory framework such as to undermine the ability to stimulate and attract investments also in other sectors.
The sub-amendment goes in the opposite direction to a trend that, as has already happened globally, sees pharmacies evolving and enriching (in terms of offer, additional services, usability and digitized access) under the management of specialized subjects capable to invest and enhance the professionalism offered by the sector in order to guarantee better services and ease of access to citizens, and to meet the new challenges proposed by the Public Administration (think of the National Plan of Chronicity) and respond to these in a factual sense and concrete.
More than 300 are pharmacies that risk being no longer supported by a company as a result of this provision, in addition to 1.500 jobs that would be in great risk, and amounting to about 500 million euros the aggregate turnover of companies in the sector that should irremediably to contract, with serious effects also on the contribution to the Treasury ".
HOSPITAL PHARMACIES
Hospitalization equal incumbent incident? Many times it is but research and organization prepare and, in part already do, a revolution that tends to eliminate mistakes, oversights, misunderstandings, fatalities that, sometimes, can cause illness, complication, aggravation and death.
If the bacteria cause 7.000 deaths per year among hospitalized patients, medicines given or missed or given in unsuitable doses represent a looming scarecrow, responsible for 20% of all the adverse events that can happen to the innocent patient.
It is called "path automation", the "easy" way that counteracts the drug risk sector that materializes in one of the following steps: prescription, transcription, interpretation, preparation, distribution and administration.
Indaginous and at risk of failure, at least human represents each stage of the administration of any drug.
The four-G rule (just patient, right dose, right medication, right moment, right way of administration) requires too much attention and focus on staff overworked and subjected to stress of anticipated and most often unexpected institutional duties. The insufficiency of the organic does the rest.
Trace the medicine from the hospital pharmacy to the patient's bed.
The innovation in the hospital is also done with new ways of distributing and administering the drugs - the strong reduction of clinical risk - the simplification of processes and activities - the reduction of waste and costs to the advantage of the sustainability of healthcare spending.
The Italian Health Economics and Health Policy magazine "Health Policy Brief" has organized a sponsored debate in the Lombardy region in Milan.
A set of high-tech hardware and software, designed primarily in a logic of reducing clinical risk and increasing efficiency through the management and traceability of the drug in all phases of the hospital journey: from the pharmacy to the department, from the computerized prescription to the preparation of the therapy and its verification to the patient's bed.
With this procedure, in the United States and in other European countries, while in Italy it has found sporadic and partial application, a drastic reduction of risks from incorrect dispensation or administration of drugs has been obtained, a simplification of the processes and activities of health workers ( pharmacists, nurses and doctors), a reinforcement of pharmacovigilance activities, as well as multiple forms of economics that can significantly consolidate the sustainability of healthcare spending. And, at the center the protected and defended patient for whom, risks canceled or radically reduced. It is right to offer him - said Giulio Gallera, Lombardy Councilor - quality services and answers to his need. Working in the hospital pathway means working in different areas that directly affect the lives of patients. Think of security, as well as the appropriateness of treatment, facilitation, outside the hospital, adherence to therapy by the patient ".
Lombardy's interest is an expression of interest which - it is desirable - extends to other regional realities and to the entire country. It is also recommended to reduce national health expenditure which, in recent years - declares v. Minister Garavaglia - recorded an incidence of 6,4% on GDP - because public funding has been reduced to the essential minimum and all this requires finding resources to finance innovation also by improving investment capacity. In this context, the automated management systems of the drug path in hospitals can be an example of how to invest in order to obtain good returns in terms of both economic and therapeutic efficiency ".