Stent Price Cap in India: Assessing Impact on key Stakeholders

Around February 2017, the National Pharmaceuticals Pricing Authority (NPPA) of India fixed the selling prices of coronary stents by an executive order which has the validity for a year. According to this notification the ceiling price of bare metal stents had been fixed at Rs7,260 per unit and that of drug eluting stents and biodegradable stents at Rs29,600 per unit.

The desired outcomes of the price capping were to reduce the cost of healthcare and provide ethical treatment to patients.

There was a huge debate and uncertainty on the merits of this policy and its impact but what is certain is that it disrupted the Cardiac Sciences offerings in the healthcare industry quite drastically. Around 8 months have passed since the prices were capped and this article, attempts to explore the impact of this land mark decision on the major stake holders in the industry namely; the patients, cardiologists, doctors, and hospitals. What have been the outcomes of the capping of stent prices? Has it had the desired impact that the Government was aiming for? 

In my article I discuss the impact on the major stakeholders:

• Patients
• Hospitals
• Doctors
• Device manufacturers

The details are available on my blog page:

https://catexhealth.com/blog/