Pharmacists role in cost saving and waste minimization study on antineoplastic drugs: A multi-central study in Turkey

Cancer diseases are the most common cause of death and chemotherapeutics used in cancer treatment have an important place in the budget allocated to health due to their high costs. This study aims to reduce disposal costs and reduce chemotherapy drug expenses through cost savings. Our study was conducted between November 2017 and July 2018 (1st semester) and between August 2018 and April 2019 (2nd semester) in three hospitals using a common chemotherapy drug preparation center. Chemotherapy sessions were rearranged in accordance with the drugs included in the treatment plans to reduce drug costs. The drug quantities billed through hospital automation programs and the disposal costs of unused drugs were reported by the pharmacists on a milligram (mg) basis. The obtained data was analyzed by the GraphPad Prism program. P<0.05 was considered significant. While the total amount of waste medicine in the 1st. period was reported as 371,866 mg, it was reported as 303,056 mg in the 2nd. period (p<0.05). While the total disposal cost was calculated at € 87,867.02 in the 1st. period, it was calculated € 26,392.48 in the 2nd. period under the control of pharmacists (p<0.01). In this study, it was observed that providing and monitoring drug preparation services by well-equipped pharmacists specialized in the field of oncology gave positive results in terms of reducing both drug expenditures and drug disposal costs. Further studies are needed to determine the safety of chemotherapy pharmacists and patients.