DRUGS cost Bolton health chiefs a staggering £55 million last year, it has been revealed.

The astonishing prescription bill faced by the Wigan and Bolton Health Authority increased by £5 million compared to the previous year.

Pills prescribed by GPs across both boroughs accounted for 13pc of the authority's budget.

And health chiefs fear the impotency drug Viagra could place an even bigger burden on finances.

Dr Robert Queenborough, medical adviser with the authority, said prescription of simple painkillers is causing the most concern.

He said: "The issues around expensive drugs do not give me sleepless nights. If the drugs are clinically effective, we will use them if they improve a person's well-being."

Limits

Drugs to prevent kidney failure cost the authority £3,500 a year and drugs prescribed to people with growth defects cost £6,000 per patient. The bill for multiple sclerosis amounted to £10,000 a patient.

In the next 12 months Dr Queenborough and his colleagues, together with GPs and clinicians, will be looking at ways to keep the drugs budget within limits.

Attention will focus on a number of areas, including antibiotic prescribing after the recent Government guidance which suggested they were not always the most effective treatment.

They will also be looking at Viagra, at asthma treatments in light of guidance that inhalers should be CFC free, and drugs prescribed for neurological diseases such as dementia, Parkinson's and Motor Neurone Disease.

"This is not a new phenomena and there are things which the health authority, GPs and the trusts are doing to try and control this budget," said Dr Queenborough.

The authority is also working on bringing the primary and secondary care clinicians together to work out the most effective drug regime for individual patients.

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