The Impact of Reimbursement Practices on the Pharmaceutical Market for Off-Patent Medicines in Slovakia.

The aim of this study was to investigate the impact of selected legislative initiatives and their implementation for off-patent medicinal products in Slovakia compared with the rest of the Visegrád Group (V4 countries). We analyzed the development of applications for the reimbursement of generic and biosimilar drugs. Particular emphasis was placed on a) the availability and penetration of biosimilars from 2006 to 2020 in Slovakia, b) a comparative analysis of biosimilars in V4 countries based on the national reimbursement lists of medicinal products for August 2021.

Potential Cost-Savings From the Use of the Biosimilars in Slovakia.

To analyse the market shares of biosimilars in Slovakia and to calculate the potential cost-savings from the use of biosimilars in Slovakia based on two different data sources. National reimbursement lists from the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia were used for analyzing the availability of biosimilars with public funding. In addition, the reimbursement dossiers of biosimilars, the justifications of reimbursement decisions by the Slovak Ministry of Health, and final reimbursement decrees, which are published on the webpage of the Slovak Ministry of Health, were utilized for this study.