In Belgium, any delivery or receipt of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances must be registered with the FAMHP. This used to be done using paper narcotic drugs order forms. Since September 2023, Narcoreg has been put in place, an online application that digitalises the entire process with time savings for pharmacists, suppliers and the FAMHP.
Nur Demirci from the Narcotics Team explains how the system used to work: “In the old system, the pharmacist had to fill out a narcotic drugs order form for every purchase of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances. That order form consisted of three identical pages. A pink copy for the pharmacist to keep, a yellow copy for the wholesaler and a white copy for the pharmacist to deliver to the FAMHP, which we kept for ten years. It was clear that digitising this process was necessary.”
Nur Demirci
Nur Demirci from the Narcotics Team explains how the system used to work: “In the old system, the pharmacist had to fill out a narcotic drugs order form for every purchase of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances. That order form consisted of three identical pages. A pink copy for the pharmacist to keep, a yellow copy for the wholesaler and a white copy for the pharmacist to deliver to the FAMHP, which we kept for ten years. It was clear that digitising this process was necessary.”
Both the experts from the Narcotics Team and the ICT Division worked at a fast pace to provide a high-quality and user-friendly application. Fortunately, they could also count on a select group of test users from the various sectors. Pharmacists and suppliers were thus already able to provide some valuable feedback during development. For example, the functionality of being able to add products not only through the narcotic code but also through the CNK code was a request that came from the field. For a while, a problem with the legal basis threatened to throw a spanner in the works, but in July 2023, www.narcoreg.be could finally be launched. Over the summer, all the users were able to test everything out for a while, and in September 2023, the application became legally mandatory.
But what exactly are the benefits? Nur Demirci: “The new system saves the pharmacist and wholesaler a great deal of time. The ability for pharmacists to upload data in bulk using a CSV file or the integration into the wholesaler’s software so that everything is automatically recorded in Narcoreg are obviously very big steps forward for them. In addition, it is also quite an improvement for us at the FAMHP. Detecting excessively large orders or losses is now far easier to do. We also have a better overview of the market: what is being sold, in what quantities, what are the trends … Moreover, we now also have easy access to both sides of the story, both pharmacist purchases and wholesaler sales. This is because the system works on the basis of ‘matches’. If the pharmacist and wholesaler declare the same quantities, then there is a match and all the products are charged for.”
Changing a way of working that has been around for decades is not something you do lightly. This is why the FAMHP has been working hard on communication and awareness-raising: consultation with and communication through, among others, the professional associations APB (General Pharmaceutical Union) and OPHACO (Association of the Cooperative Pharmacies in Belgium), mailings to individual pharmacists, interviews in the trade press and news items, manuals and FAQs on the FAMHP website and support for our services by e-mail or telephone. Nur: “Yes, we have seen in the first six months that there is still a learning curve among the pharmacists and so we are trying to give them maximum support. We see that mistakes are made unknowingly – for example, we have had to correct about eight thousand returns so far. But everyone is of good will; truly obstinate pharmacists who do not want to use the system despite the legal requirement can fortunately be counted on one hand. Thus far, it has only had to happen once, but enforcement measures such as an official report, with accompanying fines, are provided for in the law.”
Such projects naturally require a great deal of effort from the FAMHP staff because the routine tasks remain. What does Nur think about that? “Despite the extra workload, I am still happy that I, along with many colleagues, was able to bring this project to fruition. Not only is following such a project from A to Z extremely instructive, it is also very satisfying. Getting positive feedback from users and knowing that almost a million and a half returns have now been made in the new system, then you just know that all this work did lead to a decent result. But I do want to emphasise that this was really a team effort by a lot of people within our division, as well as in the ICT and Communications Divisions and even external partners such as SMALS, eHealth, pharmacists, hospital pharmacists and wholesalers. I should certainly not forget my division head Philippe De Buck, who took the first steps towards this project even before I was working at the FAMHP, and whose technical knowledge certainly added value. And the future? The work is not yet done. We will continue to look at how we can improve the system for users and how we can use the data even better.”
Goedele Louwagie – Alain Dupont – Greet Declerck – Philippe De Buck – Nur Demirci – Hanne Lavrysen
Our FAMHP experts
Nur Demirci holds a master’s degree in biomedical sciences and is a member of the Narcotics Team and Precursors Team at the DG Inspection. She held a key role as a project manager in developing Narcoreg.
