How Drugstoc answers the drug quality question
Getting quality medicines is not always easy in a developing country like Nigeria. For a long time in the country, rich patients suffering from serious aliments sought drugs abroad because of issues around unavailability and poor quality. The poor who could not afford good medicines either developed complications or died.
The situation is, however, gradually changing with the entry of Drugstoc, a multi-channel, cloudbased platform with over 7,000 highquality drugs.
The platform exists to empower healthcare providers fulfil their mandate for a healthier Africa. Drugstoc seeks ways to improve access to pharmaceutical products and services. It believes in working together with industry players to eliminate counterfeit drugs and the hassles of getting proper and good quality medication at affordable rates.
Chibuzo Opara is the managing partner and co-founder of Drugstoc. He says the company exists to solve the problems of fragmented supply chain market, counterfeiting and in-transparent pricing.
“Oftentimes hospitals have challenges obtaining quality drugs at affordable rates. This leads to issues
for patients. So, what we do is to work with the providers to bring them good products,” he says.
The firm was founded by Opara, a medical doctor and health economist, and Adham Yehia, an expert in health facilities management. Both of them met in the Netherlands while doing their post-graduate studies.
Yehia already had a background in managing healthcare facilities in Nigeria, so it was easier for the two to start.
But something generally motivated Opara to think of setting up Drugstoc.
“By the time I got back to Nigeria, I had already met my partner. We started doing management consulting for a group of healthcare facilities and found out that sourcing quality medication and medical consumables was not optimised for the health provider. It was a lot of work finding and sourcing the right medication these facilities requested,” he says.
“Back then, sourcing for medication for the facilities we managed proved challenging. If you asked us the difference between this and that drug, we would be unable to give you the assurance regarding the quality of the drugs. This was unacceptable to us, but we decided to take on the challenge head on,” he recalls.
Sourcing drugs from Drugstoc is a simple process: You go on the platform, place an order and within 24 hours the products will be supplied, according to Opara. The platform offers a myriad of payment, credit and financing solutions which are adapted to the realities of the pharmaceutical supply chain in the country.
The drug firm works with over 800 pharmacies and with the Association of General and Private Medical Practitioners of Nigeria, which has over 2,000 registered members.
The company also works with all the big drug manufacturers in Nigeria.
It is ISO 9001-2015- certified for quality management services.
“Whenever you come on our platform, all the processes are consistent,” Opara boasts.
He explains that the company’s philosphy revolves around empowering healthcare providers to provide the best services to Nigerians.
“Providing services in Nigeria is very tough in any industry. So, you do not want the healthcare providers to be bothering themselves about how to access the supply chain.”
The firm deploys artificial intelligence (AI) and blockchain technology to enhance its track and trace capability with a view to sanitising the system.
“What we do is to streamline the whole area by offering them value in terms of being able to get access to quality drugs,” he says.
The growth of the company has been tremendous since 2017. So far this year, the amount of prescriptions through hospitals and pharmaceuticals that the firm serviced in the first three months of this year was equal to what it did throughout last year.
Opara reminds Nigerians that Drugstoc’s products are not expensive because of the firm’s advantage of doing huge volumes.
“Healthcare market is a human related industry,” he says.
“As you know, we have a huge population of people in the country that want to have good healthcare system. It is one of the markets you cannot charge premium prices, so you have to provide value,” he adds.
Today, the firm’s products are in several hospitals, pharmacies and in the hands of hundreds of healthcare providers.
He says that there are lots of regulations around manufacturing of drugs, stressing that NAFDAC has done well on its regulatory function.
“I would say that we need fewer regulations there, not more regulations,” he recommends.
“This is because the people who are in the limelight are over- regulated. So, it is the people who are not in the limelight who get to do whatever they like.”