Evaluation of medical prescription costs for systemic antibiotics in the Ferrara USL

This report presents the results of a study of the costs of medical prescriptions for patients in the Ferrara USL region; prescriptions from general and specialist physicians for systemic antibiotics were examined. The top five categories accounting for the highest cost of the prescribed antibiotics were examined for the period between the second half of 1997 through the second half of 1999. Data on the variation in pharmaceutical costs over time, total pharmaceutical costs versus total health costs, the relative rate of total pharmaceutical costs, and a comparison of the per person pharmaceutical costs in Ferrara, the regional districts and the national averages are presented. A challenge in the study was the lack of diagnostic information on the prescriptions, leading to an inability to assess the appropriateness of the medication for the diagnosis. Proper training for physicians, using guidelines, could represent one means of improving the quality and optimal use of limited resource...