News / OECD highlights healthcare waste

01 February 2017 Seamus Ward

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It is likely that around a fifth of healthcare spending makes little or no difference to good health outcomes, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Tackling wasteful spending image

Its report, Tackling wasteful spending on health, said it was alarming that such a significant proportion was at best ineffective and at worst wasteful at a time when public budgets were under great pressure around the world. It identified waste in clinical care, including procedures of low value; operational waste (such as in procurement) and governance-related waste.

‘Governments could spend significantly less on healthcare and still improve patients’ health. Efforts to improve the efficiency of health spending at the margin are no longer good enough,’ it added.

The report said high numbers of patients in OECD countries were unnecessarily harmed at the point of care. And more than 10% of hospital spending was on correcting preventable medical mistakes or infections caught in hospital.

It said there was a range of opportunities to spend less on pharmaceuticals, including not throwing away unused drugs. It pointed to a 2010 study that estimated the annual cost of drugs discarded at home by patients in England was £200m. The UK could also make large savings on biosimilar medicines – eight key products are scheduled to lose their patents between 2016 and 2020.

The OECD summed up strategies to reduce waste as: 

  • Stop doing things that do not bring value – for example, unnecessary surgeries and clinical procedures
  • Swap when equivalent but less pricey alternatives of equal value exist – for example, by encouraging the use of generic drugs, developing advanced roles for nurses, or ensuring patients who do not require hospital care are treated in less resource-consuming settings.