Opening of the national pharmacy connection system
(Baonghean.vn) - On the morning of August 24, in Hung Yen province, the Ministry of Health held a national online conference to deploy information technology applications to connect drug supply facilities.
Comrade Vu Duc Dam - Member of the Party Central Committee, Deputy Prime Minister chaired the conference.
At Nghe An bridge, comrade Le Minh Thong - Member of the Provincial Party Standing Committee, Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee chaired the conference.
Lax drug management
Speaking at the opening of the Conference, Minister of Health Nguyen Kim Tien emphasized: Drug supply activities still have many shortcomings, notably that Vietnam is a country where the situation of buying and selling drugs without prescription, especially buying and selling antibiotics at an alarming level, drugs of unknown origin, fake drugs, and poor quality drugs.
The main reason for this situation is that the management of drug supply facilities is ineffective, there are no effective tools to help people know information, origin, quality of drugs, prices as well as help state management agencies in checking and controlling drug trading activities on the market.
Therefore, the Ministry of Health has coordinated with the Viettel Military Industry and Telecommunications Group to develop a project to strengthen control of prescriptions and retail prescription drugs for the period 2017 - 2020.
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| View of Nghe An bridge. Photo: Thanh Le |
Accordingly, the Ministry of Health has selected the provinces of Phu Tho, Hung Yen, Vinh Phuc, and Nam Dinh to pilot the information technology project to connect pharmacies. To date, 25 provinces have implemented the information technology project to connect pharmacies.
4,178 drug retail establishments have been granted accounts, 1,915 establishments regularly update data on drug trading activities, 22,196 prescriptions have been updated on the website:http://duocquocgia.com.vn.
“The application of information technology to connect drug suppliers makes it easy for people to access drug information such as origin, expiry date, usage, and dosage. Drug suppliers have effective tools to serve their business activities such as statistics, reporting, strict control of drug expiry dates, and warnings when drugs are about to expire.
At the same time, promptly receive directive documents from management agencies such as information on recalled drugs, drugs that do not meet quality standards, control prices, drug origins, prevent the sale of prescription drugs that are not in accordance with regulations in order to use drugs reasonably, safely, effectively, and at reasonable prices, protect, care for, and improve people's health" - the head of the health sector affirmed.
Speaking at the Conference, Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Le Minh Thong said: In Nghe An, there are currently 255 pharmacies, 580 drugstores, and 1,181 wholesale and retail drug agents.
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| Comrade Le Minh Thong speaks at the Conference. Photo: Thanh Le |
Since 2018, Nghe An Department of Health has coordinated to deploy software to manage medical and pharmaceutical establishments in the province called Medcomm - Community Health Network. Medcomm is a software that can be used on computers, tablets, smartphones with both app and web versions.
Through Medcomm, users can find pharmacies, clinics, beauty salons and medical units on a map by region and nearest to them according to the phone's location.
Medcomm publicly and clearly displays the types of licenses, operating functions, images of each facility as well as directions, phone contact or even individual comments about the facility's services.
As of August 20, 2018, Viettel Nghe An has directly handed over and re-instructed 81 pharmacies on how to use the software. It is expected that by the end of August 2018, the connection will be completed for 255 GPP-standard pharmacies in the area; by the end of 2018, the connection of 480 medicine cabinets at commune health stations will be completed; by the end of 2019, the connection of drug retail establishments in the area will be basically completed.
The Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee proposed that the Ministry of Health issue and amend legal documents in accordance with the actual situation, creating a legal corridor for the Departments of Health in inspecting the implementation of regulations on information technology connection. For service providers, it is necessary to build software that meets the requirements of interconnection and drug lists. Departments and branches should strengthen propaganda so that drug suppliers are clearly aware of the benefits of connection.
What to do now
Speaking at the conference, Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam emphasized: the immediate tasks of the health sector are: Deploying a synchronous system of grassroots health care towards establishing health records for people and moving towards electronic medical records. The second task is to connect and manage the entire drug retail system.
According to the Deputy Prime Minister, the management of drug sales in Vietnam is among the laxest in the world; the rate of antibiotic resistance in Vietnam is among the highest in the world; the prices of drugs at retail pharmacies are not yet managed. Currently, we do not have any tools to help people recognize the uses, how to use and expiry dates of drugs. We need to overcome this soon.
It is believed that the use of management software will eliminate all unfair trading practices. The software will help make the drug trading activities public and transparent, for the health of the people.
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| Panoramic view of Nghe An bridge. Photo: Thanh Le |
According to the Deputy Prime Minister, in order for the Prime Minister's Directive on strengthening management and connecting drug supply facilities dated August 23, 2018 to come into life, it requires the drastic participation of all levels and sectors. The Ministry of Health will provide detailed and specific instructions for persuasive propaganda.
"This is a job that brings great benefits to the people and the health sector. First of all, health workers support this policy. Along with that is the strong consensus of the entire political system, contributing to the successful implementation of Resolution No. 20-NQ/TW dated October 25, 2018 of the Party Central Committee on people's health care in the new situation," said Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam.
At the conference, Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam, Minister of Health Nguyen Thi Kim Tien, Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Thanh Hung and delegates pressed the button to deploy the pharmacy connection system.