On a recent visit to our local Amcal pharmacy, we were told that the proprietary brand of prescription medicine that we normally buy, would no longer be stocked, and only a generic brand would be on offer.
I think that it is generally believed that it is more profitable for the pharmacy to sell the generic item instead of a proprietary brand.
This is not a quibble about generic drugs per se, but about the chemist not offering a CHOICE of brands, at the expense of reducing the competition of the drug manufacturers, and, when a different brand of the same product can be a different colour, shape or size and can lead to confusion for the customer.
I believe this selfish move to motivated by greed, and is not in the interests of good business.
Robin.
Most pharmacies have a policy of selecting the generic version of a medication unless informed otherwise by the patient or the doctor (usually in the form of a tick box on the script). The reason being in the vast majority of cases the generic version is cheaper with identical active ingredients.
Unfortunately, medications have an expiry date. If very few patients/doctors were, like yourself, requesting the original brand, it may simply be unviable for the pharmacy to stock it any more. If you prefer or require the original brand, your best bet would be to go to a larger pharmacy that may have a larger customer base and therefore viably be able to stock that brand.
Did you ask them how they arrived at this decision? Perhaps the name brand supply was unreliable?
Alternatively as the pharmacies are often independently owned, it may be a choice by the owner(s). Have you tried another Amcal pharmacy, with a different owner, to see if they too have stopped buying that medication in?
As @Peterchu mentioned; did your doctor require you to take the name brand? Either way, if you are a regular at the pharmacy, and they don’t carry that particular medication, you can ask for them to get it in. The Amcal where we bought all my mother’s medications offered to get stuff in if they didn’t have it on hand for any reason. They even rang a number of suppliers to get a hold of things for us.
If you have trouble with discerning which tablets to take, many pharmacies will put together Webster packs at no charge for you. The one we used for my mother, delivered at no cost once a week, the packs as needed as well as anything else we needed.
Another alternative is a pill box which is covered extensively in another topic. Find a pill box that suits you and pack your pills in according to when you need to take them.
The other reason they might no longer be stocked is the original producer of the medicine has ceased production or distribution to Australia as its profitability has declined since restrictions for producing generics have been removed. They could be focusing on more profitable medicines which don’t have competition of the generics.
Another reason is scarcity of supply. The chemist may not be able to source the branded medicine in enough quantity to have stock to meet customer requirements.
Do you have the name of the medicine in question? This might allow members to check its status.
Smaller pharmacies in smaller regional centres do not have the demand to support carrying more than one brand of product. The most common prescription medicines are often prescribed in different strengths, increasing the stock levels required, hence it is more effective to carry just one brand.
Personal experience is medications not in daily demand may not be on the shelf, IE are ordered in. They may come the next day from a nearby larger pharmacy of the same chain in a not too distant town, or take several days from a central warehouse somewhere in another state. The second option is usually aligned to the preference of the pharmacy’s logistics chain.
It’s only an issue because of the smaller community we live in. I’ve learnt to phone both our locally accessible pharmacies with the details asap of any new and perhaps less common prescription. It saves, especially if it is from the specialist (not local of course) and there are big city pharmacies at their doorstep.
