Acofarma has donated the raw materials necessary to start up a formulation laboratory in the hospital of the Senegalese city, since the lack of medicines is a constant in Senegal, as commented by the member of the board of LASEMI Cooperation (the section of the Spanish Society of Individualized Medicine dedicated to social responsibility) and promoter of this initiative, Martín Muñoz.
«There is a lot of instability in the market of available drugs, and the solution does not always lie in international cooperation or the NGOs and foundations operating in the area. There are real and important difficulties in this regard. If we have shortages here in Europe, it is easy to imagine what is happening there,» said the expert.
Because of this problem, the existence of a hospital pharmacy that offers the possibility of manufacturing basic medicines to cover the real needs of the hospital’s area of influence with all the guarantees of quality is essential. «Acofarma has a track record of more than 75 years in the market. During this time, our commitment has been to guarantee universal access to health and wellness. For this reason, we actively collaborate both with LASEMI and with other institutions in different projects that help to improve people’s lives in a real way,» stressed the laboratory’s general manager, Francesc Balletbó.
On this occasion, the raw materials needed to formulate the medicines most in demand by the hospital in Thiès, the third largest city in Senegal, were provided. Most of these were compounds for preparing pediatric syrups and capsules, and this year it is planned to start making eye drops. «All the chemical products donated have the highest quality standards and the safety and guarantees of a top-level pharmaceutical laboratory, which guarantees the effectiveness of the medicines made with them,» said Balletbó.
In fact, the whole project is based on imposing a system where quality is paramount throughout the process of creating medicines. When it began at the beginning of last year (it is expected to run until 2024), the first step was to improve the protocols of all the elaborations already being made at the hospital. To this end, a rigorous computerized system was set up.
The objective pursued by the members of LASEMI was to achieve greater coordination between the pharmacy and the other services of the center, so that all the healthcare personnel could be aware of the aspects necessary for proper operation.
Finally, for this purpose, a pharmacotherapeutic guide was drawn up which compiles all this data and makes it available to the different hospital services. This guide is constantly updated to know what drugs are available, the raw materials stored, the formulas that can be prescribed. «It is a very important step in developing a way of working that allows us to have real-time information and that also guarantees the traceability of all the drugs made in the laboratory,» Muñoz concluded.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
