Pharmaceutical News
Hurdles to remote consultation stagnate the prescription rate of antiviral drugs
2022/06/12

Since May 26th, people with a positive lateral flow test result are considered a confirmed COVID case after being seen and checked by a doctor, according to the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC).  The CECC hopes that this would help patients with severe conditions to access the oral antiviral drugs more quickly.  However, the data in the past week shows a prescription rate of just 10%, lower than the 15% expected by experts.  Doctors pointed out that many hurdles remain to be resolved in order to improve the prescription rate.  One of the hurdles is that the remote consultation facility is beyond the reach of some population groups.  They are not able to have their test results confirmed by doctors and to get prescriptions remotely.

So far, the highest daily prescription rate was 21% on May 30; however, from May 31 to June 2, it fell to 10% -11%.  On June 3, the daily prescription rate was only 7%.

The data suggests that the acceptance of doctor’s confirmation of a positive lateral flow test result as a confirmed COVID case has little impact on the increase in the daily prescription rate of oral antiviral drugs. Dr. Lin Chia-Mo of the HsinKong Memorial Hospital pointed out that the stagnant daily prescription rate could be because that the outbreak has already reached its peak in northern Taiwan.  The CECC should now closely observe the situation in southern Taiwan.

Doctors pointed out that not only the elderly but also some young people do not know how to send the image of the positive test results from their mobile phones to the doctors for a remote consultation. 

On the other hand, doctors have to be very careful about prescribing antiviral drugs to patients who are on multiple medications.  Some patients would lie about their severe conditions in order to get the oral antiviral drugs.  Doctors must check the electronic patient records to verify the conditions and medication records before prescribing the oral antiviral drugs.

The NHIA also requests doctors to report and upload their prescriptions of oral antiviral drugs to the cloud-based databank within 24 hours of the prescriptions.  Otherwise, their claim of NHI service fees might be rejected.

【2022-06-05 / United Daily】