Canada’s National Pharmaceutical Strategy: Improving access to medicines or containing costs by limiting patient/physician treatment choices?

For More Information on Canada’s National Pharmaceutical Strategy Visit: NPSUpdate.com

At the 2006 World Patients Congress, patient advocates from around the world gathered to endorse the International Alliance of Patient Organizations’ (IAPO) declaration of patient centered care. The declaration describes five key principles of patient centered care including “choice and empowerment”, i.e.: patients have a right and responsibility to participate as a partner in making healthcare decisions that affect their lives. By engaging patients in the management of their own health, patient centered care improves the quality of life for patients and can save health care resources by focusing on improved outcomes.

Patient choice is a fundamental principle of patient centered care, but, contrary to this principle, collaborative initiatives by provincial and other government drug plans in Canada are designed to contain drug plan costs by limiting treatment choices and restricting access to medicines. The Canadian Optimal Medication Prescribing Utilization Service (COMPUS) is a program driven by public drug plan payers that will limit choice and access. COMPUS is one of several initiatives that are becoming elements of Canada’s National Pharmaceutical Strategy. Key areas of focus for COMPUS are proton pump inhibitors, diabetes medications and anti-hypertensives.

Over the past two decades, the impacts of improved treatments for ulcers and reflux disease, including proton pump inhibitors, are enormous, both in terms of the quality of life for patients and in terms of saving health resources. An aging population and the growth in the burden of chronic disease requires an outcomes-based approach that sees patients and providers as partners in achieving better outcomes and that focuses on the needs of the patient instead of a narrow focus on cost containment driven by the needs of the health system itself.