National List of Essential Medicines, 2nd Edition
- Sets what may be prescribed and stocked at each level of care rather than listing medicines in the abstract: every entry carries its international nonproprietary name, form and dosage, and is marked for availability at dispensary, health centre without beds, health centre with beds and community reference hospital.
- Is organized by therapeutic class, from injectable solutions and vitamins through haematology, hormones, endocrinology and contraceptives, and is then repeated in a full alphabetical index, so the same list serves both a prescriber and a procurement officer.
- Carries dosage-level restrictions where clinical safety requires them, including an explicit instruction not to use gentian violet in children under three months.
- Includes items that mark the level of care the list assumes, such as erythropoietin at 1,000 IU per 0.5 mL and 6,000 IU per 0.6 mL, and 7.1 percent chlorhexidine digluconate releasing 4 percent chlorhexidine for umbilical cord care.
- Is the second edition, coordinated by the director of the pharmacy, medicines and traditional medicine directorate, which makes it the reference against which stockouts and procurement lists can be judged.
The National List of Essential Medicines is the instrument that determines which medicines the Haitian public health system selects, procures and is expected to keep available, and at which level of care. This is its second edition, coordinated by the director of the Direction de la Pharmacie, du Médicament et de la Médecine Traditionnelle and dated January 2020, running to some 148 pages of therapeutic classes and entries. Its practical reach is wide: it is the reference for public procurement of medicines, for what facilities at each level of the pyramid are expected to stock, and for judging the completeness of supply in the periodic assessments of service delivery. The corpus holds a National List of Health Institutions (2015) and health-service delivery evaluations but had no essential-medicines list before this batch, so the document closes a specific gap on the pharmaceutical side of the sector.
How to cite
Ministry of Public Health and Population (MSPP), 2020, National List of Essential Medicines, 2nd Edition, https://oldwebsite.mspp.gouv.ht/wp-content/uploads/Liste-Nationale-des-M%C3%A9dicaments-Essentiels-2020.pdf