A drug used to treat chronic heart failure is set to be added to the Pharmacy-Of-Your-Choice (POYC) scheme in the coming days, the health ministry has said.<\/p>\n
In a statement Tuesday, the ministry said the drug Entresto, a branded version of the combination medication sacubitril\/valsartan, was being added to the POYC scheme, which provides medications treating chronic conditions for free.<\/p>\n
Some 4,000 people will benefit from the drug, the ministry said, adding the addition represented an investment of \u20ac6 million.<\/p>\n
Entresto is used to treat chronic heart failure, a condition the ministry noted affects thousands of people. It added that Entresto had been successfully used in several countries, in particular for patients who have not responded to standard treatments.<\/p>\n
Adults, adolescents and children aged one year and over can take the drug, which is available in three different doses, allowing it to be adapted to each patient\u2019s needs. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Health Minister Jo Etienne Abela said the addition was built on other steps taken to improve patient care, including the introduction of drugs such as empagliflozin (Jardiance), used for adults with type 2 diabetes and to prevent worsening heart failure and kidney disease.<\/p>\n
Etienne Abela said the introduction of Entresto would be carried out in a gradual and monitored manner to ensure patient care continues uninterrupted.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis measure helps to protect patients with heart problems. This continues to strengthen a health system that offers quality, equity and hope to all patients\u201d, the minister said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Government is committed to continuing to offer the best care to Gozitan and Maltese patients so that we can continue to safeguard the health and sustainability of our systems.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A drug used to treat chronic heart failure is set to be added to the Pharmacy-Of-Your-Choice (POYC) scheme…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":410720,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[103,61,60,371],"class_list":{"0":"post-410719","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-medication"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=410719"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410719\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/410720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=410719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=410719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=410719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}