Iron Chelator Medications Used by Patients with Beta Thalassemia Major, Thalassemia Research Center, Iran, 2015

Selection of iron chelator medication for thalassemic patients depends on clinical and laboratory characteristics such as age, serum ferritin and severity of different organ damage. Patient choice is also important because the compliance to treatment is essential. Policy makers should decide to import brands versus to facilitate making medicationsin the country. Insurance companies also should decide for coverage the costs. In this paper we report the current situation of iron chelator usage for patients with beta thalassemia major in our center.
We reviewed data the medical records of patients in November 2015.
There were 463 patients on iron chelator medications. Three hundred and thirty patients (71.2%) had regular blood transfusions and reminders were not on regular blood transfusion. Two hundred and fifty one (54%), and 212(46%) were using one or two iron chelators, respectively. Two hundred and two (44%) patients were using a combination of a parenteral and one oral medication. Sixty seven (14%) patients were using only parenteral iron chelator. The most common used medication was Osveral (made in Iran by Osveh Pharmaceutical) in about one third of patients. All non-transfusion dependent patients were using Osveral. The parenteral medication (Desferrioxamine) was distributed in two brands. One imported brand as Desferal (Novartis) and the other as Desfonak (made in Iran by Ronak Daru).Deferiprone(made in Avesina, Iran) was used in combination with desferrioxamine in 141 patients and as the only treatment in 11 patients.
Availability of different types of medications makes the opportunity to select the best protocol for patients.