Impact of drug shortages on the work of hospital pharmacists in Japan

TL;DR

This study shows that drug shortages in Japan are causing significant extra work for hospital pharmacists, costing millions annually.

Contribution

The first nationwide survey on the impact of drug shortages on hospital pharmacists in Japan.

Findings

98.1% of responding hospitals reported negative effects from drug shortages.

Pharmacists spent a median of 19.5 hours over 32 days handling shortages.

Estimated annual labor cost for drug shortage management is 7.1 billion JPY in Japan.

Abstract

Currently, no nationwide reports exist that describe the effects of drug shortages on the work of hospital pharmacists in Japan. Using a questionnaire survey, we evaluated here the impact of recent drug shortages on the work of hospital pharmacists in Japan.

We distributed a questionnaire to the directors of the pharmacy departments of 853 hospitals belonging to the Japan Municipal Hospital Association. The questionnaire consisted of questions on the situation regarding recent drug shortages at the responding hospitals and the time spent by hospital pharmacists dealing with drug shortages between February 13, 2024, and March 15, 2024.

The proportion of hospitals that answered at least one survey question was 25.7% (219/853). Almost all respondents (98.1% [214/218]) answered that the recent drug shortages negatively affected other practices of the hospital pharmacy. The median time spent dealing with drug shortages in all responding hospitals was 19.5 h of 32 days (including 23 weekdays). The estimated annual labour cost of hospital pharmacists required to deal with the recent drug shortages in the 8,110 hospitals of Japan amounted to 7.1 billion JPY/year (approximately 50 million USD/year).

A survey of directors of hospital pharmacy revealed that recent drug shortages have been a burden on pharmacists at most hospitals, as they have spent a notable amount of time dealing with such drug shortages.

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