Crisis as blood pressure drugs run out of stock

Patient suffering from hypertension in the country are staring at life threatening crisis after it emerged that hospitals have been operating without critical drugs for months.

The country has a “critically low” stock of Carditan AM and Carditan H, largely used to regulate hypertension which have seen a disruption in their supply chain.

This has forced patients to use alternative medicines which are not working for them.

Carditan-H reduces risk of stroke and is taken once daily by patients with severe hypertension.

Hypertensive patients are always advised to continue taking their medication because stopping could worsen their underlying conditions.

Failing to take hypertension medicines as prescribed by doctors’ raises chances of heart attack, a stroke, kidney failure or other complications.

However, there are blood pressure medications, known as antihypertensive, which are available by prescription to lower high blood pressure (HBP or hypertension).

The variety of classes of high blood pressure medications include a number of different drugs which are Diuretics, Beta-blockers, ACE inhibitors, Angiotensin II receptor blockers, Calcium channel blockers, Alpha blockers, Alpha-2 Receptor Agonists, Combined alpha and beta-blockers, Central agonists, Peripheral adrenergic inhibitors and Vasodilators.

The global epidemic of hypertension is largely uncontrolled and hypertension remains the leading cause of non-communicable disease deaths worldwide.

Suboptimal adherence, which includes failure to initiate pharmacotherapy, to take medications as often as prescribed, and to persist on therapy long-term, is a well-recognized factor contributing to the poor control of blood pressure in hypertension.

Several categories of factors including demographic, socioeconomic, concomitant medical-behavioural conditions, therapy-related, healthcare team and system-related factors, and patient factors are associated with non-adherence.

Understanding the categories of factors contributing to non-adherence is useful in managing it.

Patients at a high risk for major adverse cardiovascular outcomes, electronic and biochemical monitoring are useful for detecting non-adherence and for improving adherence.

Increasing the availability and affordability of these more precise measures of adherence represent a future opportunity to realize more of the proven benefits of evidence-based medications.

In the absence of new antihypertensive drugs, it is important that healthcare providers focus their attention on how to do better with the drugs they have.

This is the reason why recent guidelines have emphasised the important need to address drug adherence as a major issue in hypertension management.

Drug shortages are caused by many factors, including difficulties in acquiring raw materials, manufacturing problems, regulatory issues, and business decisions, as well as many other disturbances within the supply chain.

This adversely affects patient care by causing substitution of safe and effective therapies with alternative treatments; compromising or delaying medical procedures; or causing medication errors.

Drug shortages also significantly burden health care provider and health care facility finances and personnel with a management strategy that includes clear policies and procedures for information gathering, decision-making, collaboration, and timely communication should be established to effectively handle drug shortages.