Gert:
The Netherlands and the USA still dispenses from bulk stock?
What are pro's and contra's?
I`ll give you one important pro. If you want a flexible market situation,
bulk dispensing will help you to acheive this. In Norway - we have a
situation where drug selection is often predetermined by the number of
different packeges each supplier offers. This system gives an advantage to
the producer offering the broadest "menue". Such products will win the
market, even with a high price. Hospitals and Drug Committees have
difficulties when trying to organise competition through tendering when the
number of package forms is considered to be one important issue.
If you wish to stimulate a market with few names and acheive lower prices, -
one strategy is to increase generic prescribing. Thus one may avoid a high
number of branded generics currently confusing patients and health
personnel. For this reason, we must keep flexibility in the market and have
capacity for pharmacy dispensing, - also in industrialised countries.
Regards
Guttorm Folkedal
E-mail: saihroga@online.no