Continuous Monitoring and Audit Methodology for Medication Procurement

Abstract

Continuous audit has presently been adopted by many public and private firms, despite different adoption levels (PwC, 2006; Vasarhelyi et al., 2012). Implementations of continuous monitoring and audit on government procurement analysis are rare, even though wastes and abuses easily occur during the process. This study analyzes medication procurement data from a Brazil city and establishes a continuous monitoring and audit system. The system aims to help internal auditors identify exceptions and anomalies in procurements for investigation and further achieve cost management in a more timely manner by introducing the comparison of exogenous data. The methodology embedded in this system will not only shed light on government procurement audit analysis but also give insights to armchair auditors to investigate open government data from different perspectives.