The Swedish drug expenses increased sharply during the 1990. The increase in cost of drug spending declined from year 2002, due to the introduction of generic substitution. ‘Generic substitution’ is a pharmaceutical term used to describe the substitution of a prescribed drug (that has an expired patent) with an equivalent alternative containing the same drug substance, formulation and strength. The substituted drug has similar bioavailability, and are approved as generics by “Läkemedelsverket” (compare EMA, FDA) This substitution of drugs has led to an eight million Swedish kronor reduction in annual costs on government drug spending. Money that can be allocated to other sectors in the healthcare system. Despite these huge savings, patients have been criticizing the generic exchange system due to perceived side effects, suspicion of a lower quality and uncertainty and confusion about what drugs to use. This might add up to poorer compliance, risk for double-medication and medicinal errors. Johan Wallér, CEO of Apoteksföreningen (a lobbying organization for pharmacy retailers), claims that an estimate of 200.000 people every year are making errors when medicating, and experience an inferior medical effect due to generic exchange. The aim of this study was to identify the problems and opportunities experienced by patients due to the introduction of generic substitution. A questionnaire study was performed including 280 customers, presenting prescriptions on drugs available for drug substitution in five different pharmacies, in Malmo (town in the southern part of Sweden). In the survey, questions were asked about what knowledge the customers had of generic substitution and from whom they had received this information. Questions were also asked about medical errors. The results from the questionnaire show that 5/280 had experienced problem with generic substitution that had had impact on their well-being. Also, patients over 56 on a long-term medication, and with multiple interchangeable medicines often run into problems with generic exchange. The patients in the survey reported a shortage/lack of communication and information from the doctors about the pros and cons with generic drugs. Some patients were confused about package looking different from what they were used to, different size, form and colour of tablets. Approximately 46 % of the patients consider the shape of tablets to be important, and 23 % said the size. Changing the shape and size of tablets may therefore have negative consequences. There is a risk of medication errors associated with the use of generics. In this survey, few people experienced side effect, but on a national basis this problem cannot be ignored, since millions of prescriptions are subject to generic substitution. This calls for the need of informing the customers in pharmacies and by physicians in a proper way.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:lnu-59554 |
| Date | January 2016 |
| Creators | Sahebezai, Benazir |
| Publisher | Linnéuniversitetet, Institutionen för kemi och biomedicin (KOB) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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