Responsible medicines use can avoid $500 billion in global health care costs, says IMS

About $500 billion in global health care costs can be avoided annually through more responsible use of medicines by health system stakeholders and a stronger alignment of their capabilities, resources and activities.

That key finding is included in a new IMS Institute for Healthcare Informatics report, Advancing the Responsible Use of Medicines: Applying Levers for Change, which identifies priority areas for improvement. The report's recommendations were discussed this week at a Health Ministers Summit hosted by the Dutch Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport, which invited the IMS Institute and the World Health Organization to contribute technical papers for the summit in Amsterdam.

The IMS Institute report covers six specific levers of opportunity to improve the use of medicines; optimizing antibiotic use; preventing medication errors; using low-cost generics where available; and managing polypharmacy