The number of patients who are taking duplicate medications has dropped by about 41 percent since clinics and hospitals were told to reduce the number of duplicate prescriptions, the National Health Insurance Administration (NHIA) said on Tuesday.
To better help patients take their medication properly and get their prescriptions refilled on time, the agency in July last year started monitoring the use of six types of drugs — those used to treat hypertension, high cholesterol, hypoglycemia, schizophrenia and depression, as well as hypnotic sedatives and anxiolytics.
The agency reviewed the prescriptions dispensed by clinics and hospitals for those drugs and refused payment for unreasonable duplicates to encourage doctors to be more cautious and to prevent accidental overdoses or adverse drug interactions.
The agency used its PharmaCloud system, which keeps patients’ recent prescription records to ensure medication safety and monitor unreasonable duplicate prescriptions of the six drug types, NHIA official Shih Ju-liang (施如亮) said.
The number of patients taking duplicate medication has been almost halved: from 83,525 people in the third quarter of last year to 48,289 in the second quarter of this year, Shih said.
“Payment for unreasonable duplications was reduced from about NT$27 million to NT$15.3 million [US$847,245 to US$480,105],” Shih said.
Statistics showed that there is a correlation between duplicated prescriptions and the age of the patient, she said.
The duplication rate for patients 71 and over was 36.3 percent, while the rate for those between 51 and 60 was 21.4 percent, she said, adding that the increased rate for the elderly might be associated with a higher rate of chronic diseases.
Getting clinics and hospitals to reduce prescription duplications is important for public safety and to prevent wasting National Health Insurance resources, the NHIA said.
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