Therapharma rolls back price of statin

Patients taking the cholesterol-lowering statins are in for a Christmas treat as Therapharma announces an 18 to 22 percent price rollback of its brand of simvastatin.

The drug comes in 10, 20 and 40-mg stock doses.

James Dio, Therapharma general manager, said they have converted into an actual price rollback the discounts which the company has been giving patients through its Health Plus Value Program.

"Now, everyone can benefit from this general price reduction," Dio said.

Therapharma’s simvastatin was introduced a year ago at half the price of a similar brand of simvastatin. In less than a year, it was able to capture a big share of the statin market.

Several multinational companies manufacturing statins recently rolled back their prices and many health practitioners attribute this to the affordable pricing set by Therapharma.

Therapharma and the other divisions of Unilab have been staunchly advocating pharmacoeconomics, which aims to deliver high-quality drugs at affordable prices.

The idea of pharmacoeconomics is to help the patient be able to take his drug for a longer period of time through a bioequivalent medicine, which can eventually translate into optimum clinical benefits at a more reasonable cost.

Although the beneficiaries of the pharmacoeconomics program are the patients, clinicians and other healthcare providers play a crucial role in the success of the program.

Being an important element in the healthcare decision process, doctors have to make sure that they prescribe a proven bioequivalent alternative drug to ensure treatment success.

On the first-year V-day celebration of Therapharma, Dio thanked the doctors and the patients for their overwhelming support of pharmacoeconomic drugs.

He noted that the success of pharmacoeconomics redounds to the benefit of patients. He refused to take credit for the success of pharmacoeconomics and the lowering of prices of the life-extending statin brands in the country.

"The doctors and the patients made it happen. We were just used as an instrument," he said.

Dio added that the various divisions of Unilab remain firm in their commitment to help make essential drugs relatively more affordable and that they hope that the price reduction will happen not only in the statin class of drugs but in other drug segments as well.

Statins have revolutionized the treatment of many cardiovascular diseases, even among those whose blood cholesterol is not elevated.

It has been shown to prolong lives and prevent heart attacks and strokes in high-risk patients, especially diabetics and those with established cardiovascular diseases and multiple risk factors such as high blood pressure, obesity and cholesterol abnormalities.

It is a prescription drug and should be bought only with a doctor’s prescription. Patients are advised to consult their physicians if they are suitable for statin therapy.