HOW TO AVOID ANOTHER FRUSTRATION OF DRUG PROCUREMENT AUCTIONS

Participants of the Forum on “Regulating healthcare: pressing issues if circulation and provision of drugs and medical products” at FAS Centre for Education and Methodology in Kazan discussed the importance of refining the Consolidated drug reference book – catalogue

Shortcomings of the drug catalogue in the Information-and-Analytical System (IAS) is one of the main reasons underlying drug procurement frustration. Although the ordering parties began to use the catalogue in 2018, the measurement units were not unified until January 2019, and the same drugs were put in different groups. As follows from the State Medicinal Drugs Register, reference drugs and relevant generics also were in different groups.

“The catalogue was launched without proper validation, and internal failures resulted to wrong estimates of the original maximum contract prices, which frustrated auctions”, pointed out Timophei Niozhegorodtsev, Head of FAS Department for Control over Social Sphere and Trade. “I.e., we see that it is not just No. 871n Order, which contains the formula and goods reproducibility.  If the catalogue is unsatisfactory, regardless of the formula, the results will be unsatisfactory.  Digitalization by itself is not an absolute benefit. It is a benefit only when the input data are standardized and systematized. It is these data that are the accurate variables in the equation and can give trustworthy results. Without it, regardless of the formula used, the final figures always will be inadequate”.

The Ministry of Healthcare has abolished use of reference prices calculating the initial (maximum) contract price: procurement is based on other methods approved in No. 871n Order. The issue of using the catalogue in the part of establishing equivalent dosage form remains. Regions keep entering heterogeneous data on the same drugs in the system.

“We should make sure that the system does not allow it even if the customer wishes, for example, to enter capsules instead of milligrams in a field. Embedded algorithms are needed to prevent such options”, says Head of FAS Department for Control over Social Sphere and Trade.

He is supported by Daria Starykh, Head of Drug Prices Regulation Unit, FAS Department for Control over Social Sphere and Trade: “The system should be maximum automated and the manual mode for entering information by customers should be excluded. Customers should not analyze all those multiple methods. They should wish to buy drugs, inform how much, and the system itself should calculate everything and offer the optimal price”.

“There is also a good news”, cheered up Timophei Niozhegorodtsev. “We have made arrangements with the Ministry of Healthcare that until a new catalogue is validated and error probability remains, the catalogue cannot be published for use at auctions”.