Evaluation of the quality and pharmacoeconomics of some generic drugs versus their reputed counterpart brands in the Saudi market

Abstract

Background: Branded drugs are usually considered as the most reputed for their safety and efficacy among health-care providers and patients rather than the cheaper branded-generic counterparts. Lacking confidence in generic drugs may lead to patient's nonadherence and treatment failure. Aims: To building up the confidence in some branded-generic drugs by evaluating their quality patient cost versus their branded counterparts. Materials and Methods: Two groups of commonly used anti-diabetic drugs including glibenclamide and metformin, respectively, were selected. Each individual group contains three generics and one reputed international branded tablets were evaluated for their quality and patient cost effect. Quantitative and qualitative examinations were conducted following the USP and BP specifications. The obtained results were statistically analyzed using analysis of variance. Results: All qualitative and quantitative pharmacopeial tests, including each respective tablets weight uniformity, tablets friability, tablets hardness, disintegration time, dissolution tests, individual drug identification test, chemical composition, and drug content uniformity, were within their pharmacopeial specifications with no statistically significant difference between the generics and the branded tablets (P = >0.152–0.255). The margin of patient cost price for the generic tablets were between 15% and 27%, 6% and 42% for the metformin and daonil groups, respectively, and the margin of the price-to-patient for the lowest price and the highest price of the generic tablets were higher in the range between 50–65% and 25–63% when compared to their respective reputed brands. Conclusions: Pharmacopeial examinations showed that generic tablets are quantitatively and qualitatively equivalent to their internationally reputed brands within the tested tablet groups with the advantage for the generic drugs being significantly the cheapest.