Free medicines distributed to patients from Mater Dei Hospital’s pharmacy totalled €24.4 million last year, 10 per cent up on 2009.
This rise is mostly due to a revision in the free medicines’ formulary, which saw the addition of 11 “very expensive” drugs to treat cancer patients, according to initial figures from a Health Ministry report on its third year in government.
The number of patients receiving free medicines for chronicillness through the Schedule V card is 124,215, but the government is in the process of overhauling the scheme to include new conditions.
Sources told The Sunday Times that conditions expected to be incorporated in the revised free medicines list include: familial dyslipidaemia (an inherited condition that can lead to heart disease); chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (a progressive disorder that makes it hard to breathe); Hirschprung’s disease (a blockage of the large intestine due to improper muscle movement in the bowel); and chronic mood disorders and chronic psychiatric disorders starting in children, such as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
Malta’s may be one of the most generous health systems in the EU, where numerous treatments are provided for free, but certain drugs and remedies, such as those for dementia, are still excluded.
The EU last year urged authorities to review this schedule to ensure the medicines on it were equivalent to those supplied freely in other member states.
Asked if the budget of the Schedule V would be expanded, a ministry spokesman said when contacted that the first phase of the reform had sought to regularise mis-entitlements, which meant the exercise was “largely cost neutral”.
The process is complete from the ministry’s end and is waitingto be taken forward “in tandem with other amendments” to the Social Security Act, spearheaded by the Family Ministry.
“Everything is approved from our end. It is now in the hands of the Family Ministry to present it to Parliament,” the spokesman said.
Another task the ministry has undertaken is reforming the way medicines are bought, to stem the problem of out-of-stock drugs by setting up a specialised agency.
The spokesman said that while complaints about out of stock medicines were justified these had to be seen in light of the fact that last year 1,316 different medicines were handed out.
Other interesting figures for 2010 show that 113,933 patients attended the outpatients’ pharmacy, an average of 312 patients a day (an increase of 9.3 per cent over the previous year).
With regard to the Pharmacy Of Your Choice scheme, the spokesman said in all 46,565 patients had last year registered to collect their free medicines from 98 pharmacies.
This scheme, introduced as a pilot project in 2007 to eradicate the antiquated system of queuing up at government pharmacies to collect their free medicine, was this year extended to Birkirkara and St Venera.
This means the scheme to date has 113 pharmacies and more than 51,500 patients. At this rate all the localities in Malta should have a POYC service by the end of 2012.