ROLE AND IMPORTANCE OF DISTRIBUTION OF MEDICATIONS IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE HEALTHCARE SYSTEM IN CROATIA: A CASE OF MEDICATION WHOLESALERS

Abstract

Healthcare within the health services, customers and operators providing these services is one of the most important economic activities of any state. Medications as products are the basis of the development for improving the quality of health services. In the past it was believed that the product is a medical procedure performed by the medical personnel. Today, medical product encompasses goods and services offered by the health institutions through specific health programmes that is again dependent on medications. In the logistic chain of medications the wholesalers have the most important role since the medication wholesale business is characterized by the megalogistic chains of distribution, which include all subjects starting from medication manufacturers to patients as users. With regard to the method and the type of activity and the number of subjects, the wholesalers are a part of the global logistics networks. In the Republic of Croatia the pharmaceutical market earns about 5-6 billion Croatian kunas annually, which shows the importance of this segment and the necessity to analyse the further development of the logistic distribution of medications through the convergence of standards of more developed countries in the European Union. In this paper we start with the assumption that, through further rationalization of the logistic distribution of medications in the form that combines optimal location, selected transportation routes and contemporary alternative selection of the transport units, we could influence the quality of the healthcare development in the Republic of Croatia. In this paper we analysed the secondary data and use the method of comparison, the case study method and the quantitative analysis of the fiscal indicators in the healthcare segment in the Republic of Croatia. The research results indicate that the positive implications for the healthcare system in the Republic of Croatia may occur in the segment of prices reduction of medications through the rationalization of the logistic distribution of medications, which is a goal of this paper.

Key words: medication distribution, distribution channels, healthcare, medication wholesalers