CEBU – Governor Hilario Davide has assured the public of the sufficiency of medicine supplies in 16 hospitals run by the provincial government here.
This, after Davide earlier approved the medicine consignment ordinance or the “Cebu Medicine Consignment System” and doctors are now required to submit a list of medicines that they would want to use.
According to Dr. Olivia Dandan, chief of Cebu Provincial Hospital-Carcar City, said this will be made the basis as to what medicine and drug supplies to be consigned by the Bids and Awards Committee’s accredited companies. The ordinance also covers the consignment of medical equipment.
“The doctors should be the one to identify the medicines because they are the ones who will issue drug prescriptions to their patients,” Dandan said.
Consignment System is a method of assuring availability of stocks wherein a consignor places its goods with the Provincial Health Office or the pharmacies of the Provincial and District Hospitals for sale, and the former being paid by the latter for only the actual quantity consumed using the money generated from the sale of the consigned goods within the agreed period of time.
Dandan said the problem in the past was they do not have adequate supply of medicines because of the long procurement procedure in the government.
But with the consignment system, she said there is no danger of medicines overtaken by their expiry dates because the consignors can easily ship these out.
An amount of P15 million is set aside as an initial Medicine Consignment
Fund. The proceeds of the sale of the consigned items will also go to the consignment fund.
In its general guidelines, the ordinance stated: “For the indigent buyers of consigned items, who are entitled to Philhealth benefits, a maximum of 70 percent of the Philhealth benefits shall be used or charged for payment for the Consigned items.
“If the amount payable for consigned items is less than 70 percent of Philhealth benefits, only the amount payable for the consigned items shall be paid to the Medicine Consignment Fund, and the balance shall form part of the income for the particular Provincial and/or District Hospital.”
For paying patients, who are entitled to Philhealth benefits, their billings shall be satisfied first. The balance from their Philhealth benefits can be used to pay for consigned items. If the balance is not sufficient, the excess shall be charged to their account.(Xerxes Alkuino)
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