Procurement of medications in the Brazilian public sector: the search for quality in bidding processes

Abstract

Introduction: The procurement of medicines is a critical stage in the Pharmaceutical Service cycle. It is a very challenging activity within the context of public procurement, as it needs to consider the economicity required by a bidding process and the quality requirements proposed by the National Medicines Policy. To achieve this goal, the pharmacist must draw up a term of reference based on health legislation. Objectives: This work aims at subsidizing the essential information that must be included in a term of reference for the procurement of medicines in order to obtain the same with the highest possible quality. Methods: To do so, searches were conducted in the Scientific Eletronic Library Online (Scielo) and Biblioteca Virtual em Saúde (BVS) databases, being complemented by search at the Judgments of the Acórdãos do Tribunal de Contas da União (TCU), Laws in the Portal da legislação and publications of health in SaudeLegis in order to select the essential items to be included in a term of reference. Results: At the end of the analysis, some important topics were listed that should be considered in a term of reference by electronic procurement for a bidding process. Conclusions: With this work we expect to contribute to the elaboration of more robust terms of reference that allow the procurement of medicines with better quality.