Switched to less effective medicine because its cheaper.

[greenwichgroove]

My mum has pretty severe medical issues and is on strong medication. It has taken a long time for her to be stable.

She has been wrote to and told she can't have her medicine anymore as its too expensive and they are giving her a cheaper medicine that didn't work before.

She has worked all her life in the nhs and it feels like a kick in the teeth.

It is a kick in the teeth! Is there not a non branded equivalent to the one that worked?

As soon as she finds the new (old) medication isn't helping her, she should go back to the GP as soon as you can so she can tell them chapter and verse. Pointless (and a waste of money, even if it is cheaper than her old meds) if she is being prescribed medication that is ineffective.

Tell her to ask her GP if there is a generic version of her old medication, it will be cheaper.

I'm a GP, and we often have to do this. It's not our decision, it's an order from higher up. However, we do have the authority to keep people on the more expensive drugs if the cheaper ones have side effects or don't help them. So she needs to go through the motions of trying it, then get back to her GP.

I've had this too. I have a lot of major pain conditions and being asthmatic my anti-inflammatory options are incredibly limited. This has resulted in me going through the hospital pain clinic for 2 years of experimentation with various medications to see what would work but not contraindicate with the asthma.

Anyway, we finally found 3 that I can take together and the combination is incredibly effective and I can move and breathe at the same time (Huzzah!) however I moved towns and into a different PCT and at my registration appointment the doctor point blank told me I had to change medications because they were on the list of medications they're not allowed to prescribe. I asked if it's due to cost (they're relatively new on the market) and she confirmed it was.

18 months down the line and all the good work of the pain clinic has been undone. My GP will only prescribe me Diclofenac (which aggravates my asthma) and on discussion with friends down the pub they've met similar problems with other medications at other surgeries in the area.

I hate that cost comes before patient wellbeing. Hate it.

Signed

SirChrisHoysThighsthatfeellikethey'retorntoshreds

Without knowing what the medication is it is impossible to comment. Everyone in the NHS at the moment is being asked to justify every penny spent and medicines are seen as a massive area for savings especially when more expensive medications don't have any more evidence than cheaper alternatives. However there always exceptions to every rule - has your mother actually spoken to anyone about the change to have it explained to her I would have thought that changes would only be made after a discussion/explanation to the patient.

Is it an epilepsy med? If so there are a lot of groups campaigning against this. Look at the Epilepsy Action website.