November 09, 2003
NHS Spending on Diabetic treatments
Just come across an interesting graph which shows what the NHS has spent on Diabetic treatments in the quarter to June 2003.
Makes for interesting reading although you do have to make some assumptions about the quantities involved.
If we assume that the glucose testing strips (an absolute necessity for ANY diabetic) are prescribed in batches of 100 then we can see that the average cost per prescription is 23.42 ukp and therefore the cost per strip is 23.42 pence. Although I understand that these are little electrodes and probably complex to develop that does seem a little extortionate.
I know when I had to buy my first batch in Canada I had to pay $85 Canadian for a box of 100 strips...
I did absolutely observe that the meters were generally given away or heavily subsidised if you bought some strips for it though so it is perfectly obvious where the relevent drug companies make their money on diabetes care.
When I got home I was prescribed the same strips here but they didn't work in my meter. I called the customer care line (mainly because the chemist couldn't be bothered to do it for me, even though they had no idea why the strips wouldn't work) and it turned out that the north american strips were incompatible with the english meter. No explanation was given but they did send me out a new meter.
I find this very interesting though, especially given that I KNOW the two strips are made in the same factory, probably side by side. Why on earth would they make the meters incompatible?
Another interesting one is the cost of intermediate or long-acting insulin. We see here that the average cost is 42.78 ukp per batch. Again, if I make an assumption that this is the cost for 10 cartridges and therefore the cost per cartridge is 4.28 ukp. I'm not sure if this is reasonable or not though it probably is... Would love to get a proper breakdown so that I could see how much these treatments cost per unit.
Thankfully, diabetics in the UK treated with anything other than diet and exercise get a medical exemption and don't have to pay for anything they get on prescription. If this wasn't the case I know this insane disease would be costing me a fortune every month.
On another related note I had a rant about misinformation on the NHS direct website a week or two ago. I note with interest they have changed the relevent text now to Type 11 diabetes is so closely linked to obesity that simply losing weight and changing lifestyle can greatly reduce the risk of developing it.
No doubt many diabetics either called or emailed to complain and have the text changed. Good.