Doctors and patients are facing major a problem as more than 180 critical drugs are in short supply across the United States.
For 55-year-old civil engineer Bruce Blair, this shortage can potentially lead to the difference between life and death.
Normally, Blair's doctors would have supplied him with cytarabine, a low-cost generic chemotherapy drug that cures a high percentage of cases, however this drug is one of more than 180 critical drugs in short supply all over the country.
According to reports, the American Hospital Association found 82 percent of patients who couldn't get medications on the shortage list experienced delayed treatment. For those who were given a substitute, 69 percent got less effective treatment.
About 60 percent of all the critical drugs in short supply are generic sterile injectables. and they come from the drug manufacturers in self-contained doses, ready to be injected. They are mostly low-cost generics given in hospital settings.
They are also critical drugs, ones used to keep patients in the intensive care unit alive, anti-cancer drugs for which there may be no substitute, and medications crucial for some surgeries.
Most of the other 40 percent on the shortage list are brand-name drugs still under U.S. government patents, for which there are no generic equivalents and few of them are critical to patient care.
Quotes
"It really cripples our ability to treat properly. And we have to become creative of how to treat patients such as this, because, often, leukemia patients can't wait for their treatments." -Dr. Dipti Patel, Virginia Cancer Specialists.
"This is really approaching crisis levels from our members' perspective. They are finding that they are having to scramble to find product, and there is certainly concern that care is going to be rationed." -Joseph Hill, American Society of Health-System Pharmacists.
Warm Up Questions
1. What is a prescription drug?
2. What is a shortage?
3. What is a generic drug?
Discussion Questions
1. Why are 180 prescription drugs across the U.S. in short supply?
2. What does this mean for patients who need these prescriptions drugs to survive?
Additional Resources
Doctors Tell Congress How to Rein in Prescription Drug Abuse
Prescription Drug Abuse Targeted as a 'Public Health Crisis'
