Foggia Today
“We have made the electronic prescription structural, both the red and the white one, much appreciated by citizens and doctors. We felt it was right to put an end to the experimentation and extensions to simplify the work of family doctors and the lives of citizens who will not have to go to doctor’s offices but will be able to receive the prescription by email or other channels on their mobile phone”.
This is what Health Minister Orazio Schillaci declares regarding the health measures contained in the Simplification Decree approved by the Council of Ministers. With the new Legislative Decree, therefore, drug prescriptions all become digital, both red and white prescriptions, i.e. those relating to drugs not reimbursed by the National Health System.
In fact, the goal is to reduce bureaucracy for family doctors, but also to help the sick themselves, especially the chronically ill and the disabled. Among the novelties of the provision there is also the one-year validity of the dematerialized prescription for chronic patients, which will allow them to stock up on medicines for 30 days of therapy, again on the basis of the doctor’s indications.
“A chronically ill person periodically needs to take the same drug – added the Minister – thanks to this rule, patients or those who take care of them in the event of non-self-sufficiency have the double advantage of not having to repeatedly go to the doctor to collect the prescription and repeatedly to the pharmacy to collect the medicines. Let us not forget that many chronic patients are elderly people, often affected by more than one chronic disease, not self-sufficient or who have difficulty moving around. The simplification of this measure is evident not only for people but also for family doctors for whom the administrative workload is lightened to the benefit of patient care”.
The new decree law also provides for greater controls on drug shortages. An internal rule modifies the current legislation making communication more timely in the event of a shortage and facilitating the supply of medicines. In particular, it is established that the communication of companies to AIFA, in the event of temporary or definitive interruption of the marketing of a drug, concerns the individual packages of medicines and that the communication of shortages is made within two months and no longer four. This will allow doctors to evaluate in time the drugs to be prescribed for the regular continuation of the therapy, avoiding disorientation and discomfort for previously informed patients.