Last update:
01-Feb-2021

OBJECTIVE To investigate the attitudes and beliefs of EOPYY (state insurance) pharmacists towards generic medicines.

METHOD The study sample comprised all (n=35) EOPYY pharmacies around Greece, with a response rate of 63.41% (104/164), and was conducted between December 2018 and April 2019. The questionnaire used was based on the Greek version of Labiris and colleagues (2015), in a self-completed online version. For statistical analysis of the results descriptive and inferential statistics were derived using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS), version 22.0.

RESULTS The majority of the sample believed that the effectiveness, safety and production standards of generic medicines (74.1%, 63.5% and 66.4%) are similar to those of the brand name medicines. Conversely, 44.2% responded negatively to the capability of the Greek authorities to ensure the quality and safety standards of generic medicines, while 59% believed that generic substitution should be performed by pharmacists. The study sample strongly believed that in life-threatening diseases (59.6%) and debilitating diseases (60.6%) the use of generic medicines should be avoided.

CONCLUSIONS EOPYY pharmacists state that they believe in generic bioequivalence, but they do not agree on their use in cases of serious or debilitating diseases. The obvious lack of information regarding the quality standards of generic medicines at pharmacist level, in combination with the lack of trust of pharmacists on their quality control by the Greek health authorities, undermines the promotional efforts for use of generic medicines.

Key words: Active substance, Bioavailability, Bioequivalence, EOPYY pharmacists, Generic medicines, Substitution.