Background: Cost of medicine is a governing factor of health-care system. It is the responsibility of the government to ensure the availability of essential medicines at an affordable price to all sections of the society. With an aim to improve the availability of essential medicines at affordable cost, the Ministry of Pharmaceutical, Chemicals, and Fertilizers implemented the drug price control order (DPCO) 2013. As per Global Burden of Disease report, mental disorders account for 13% of total disability-adjusted life years lost for years lived with disability. We conducted this study with the aim to analyze percent cost variation of different psychiatric disorders medicine brands available in Indian market with reference to DPCO.
Objective: The objective of this study was to calculate percent cost variation of different brands of commonly used psychiatric disorder drugs available in Indian market with reference to DPCO, India.
Materials and Methods: Information regarding cost of different brands of these medicines available in Indian market was taken from latest edition of Current Index for Medical Specialties. Percent cost variation between DPCO price and least costly brand as well as most expensive brand of individual medicine of selected strength was calculated and compared.
Results: A total of 18 commonly used psychiatric disorder medicines were included in this study. Percent cost variation between DPCO price and least expensive brand available in Indian market was found maximum (69.4586) for risperidone and minimum (0.6711) for phenytoin 100 mg capsules. Percent cost variation between DPCO price and most expensive brand available in Indian market was found maximum (812.6246) for risperidone 1 mg tablet and minimum (zero) for clozapine 50 mg tablet.
Conclusions: In our study, we found that for most of the formulations, DPCO price was higher than least expensive brand available in Indian market. Indian government needs to revise drug pricing policy to bring all brands prices within ceiling price limits to achieve goal of universal health coverage.
Key words: Drug Price Control Order; National List of Essential Medicine; Out-of-Pocket Expenditure; National Pharmaceutical Price Authority
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