Drug pricing regulator National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) fixing the prices knee implants is the outcome of union health ministry’s path breaking initiative to bring down prices of life saving devices like knee implant. NPPA brought down the prices of knee implants after examining various types of implants based on construction material, application and technological aspects.
In a bid not to push so called `new technologies’ with unproven claims of superiority over standard implants, cobalt-chromium implants used in total knee replacement, used in 80 per cent of knee replacement surgeries, are capped at Rs 54,720, leading to an average price reduction of up to 65 per cent.
Cobalt-chromium implants are currently sold at prices ranging from Rs1.5 to Rs 2.5 lakh. Similarly, total knee replacement implants made of special metals, such as titanium and oxidised zirconium, cannot have a price of more than Rs 76,600, which is far less than the prevailing rates that range between Rs 2.5 to Rs 4.5 lakh.
Hospitals cannot charge more than Rs 56,490 for high-flexibility implants that otherwise carry an average MRP of Rs 1, 81,728 at present. Revision implants, used for replacing an older implant and specialised implants for cancers, has been capped at Rs 1,13,950, as per ceiling price calculated by NPPA, which earlier carried an average MRP of Rs 2,76, 869.
A similar move was made in terms of coronory stents when it was included in the National List of Essential Medicines (NLEM) subsequent to a series of meetings with the National Health Systems Resource Centre (NHSRC) and cardiologists in 2015.
Government after a series of meetings with the National Health Systems Resource Centre (NHSRC) and cardiologists in 2015 concluded that all cardiac stents are of the same quality and accordingly capped the price as per Schedule 1 of Drug Price Control Order (DPCO) after incorporating in the national list of essential medicines.
Further to this, National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) through a notification on February 14, 2017 fixed ceiling prices of cardiac stents with cost of bare metal stents brought down to Rs. 7,260 from Rs. 45,000 and that of drug eluting stents to Rs. 29,600 from about almost Rs. 1.2 lakh.
The step was taken to fix a standardised specification of stents and its MRP to stop fleecing of patients. NPPA has directed hospitals/nursing homes/clinics utilizing coronary stents shall specifically and separately mention the cost of the coronary stent along with its brand name, name of the manufacturer/importer/batch number and other details, if any, in their billing to the patients or their representatives.
