Pharmaceutical Costs in Social Security Organization and Components Influencing its Utilization

Medicine is an inseparable link of health chain; a flaw in health process for high expenditures of the medicine or inappropriate access shall certainly bring higher costs in the mentioned procedure. The present study aimed to evaluate the impact of the households’ income، geographical access، patients’ direct payment، physician''s visit and insured'' inpatient rate on the amount of medicine utilization in the pharmacies contracted with the Social Security Organization (SSO). This was a descriptive and analytical study. The bank data in 1988-2009 from SSO''s provincial branches were used to evaluate the impact of the above mentioned elements on drug utilization rate. The study subjects included 24 million individuals under coverage of the organization appearing before the direct and indirect health section to receive medicine during the mentioned years. We analyzed the data using linear fixed-effects models by EViews Software. The findings of the study showed that the specialist''s visit (β=0. 37)، inpatient rate in indirect health section (β=0. 17)، geographical access (β=0. 17)، GP''s visit (β=0. 16) and out of pocket (OOP) payment (β= -0. 12) had the highest impact on drug utilization، respectively. The households’ income (P=0. 927; β= -0. 005)، inpatient rate (P=0. 076; β= 0. 033) and physician''s visit in direct health section (P=0. 577، β= 0. 026) had not significant effect on the medicine utilization in the contracted pharmacies. Drug provision is of high importance in away that any growth in the price does not play an avoiding role in its consumption، which may cause catastrophic costs for some households. The SSO''s policy makers shall ponder about the upright distribution in order for better healthcare services utilization.