Price analysis of medicines used in general anesthesia before and after the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic: a retrospective observational study

Abstract

Objectives: with the emergence of the pandemic in early 2020, there was an increase in the prices of medicines used in hospital anesthetic procedures. The main objective of this study was to assess the variations in prices of anesthetics used in general anesthesia procedures between the periods prior to and after the beginning of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Methods: we investigated 105 anesthesic records of exploratory laparotomies or laparoscopic procedures performed in a private hospital in southern Brazil and analyzed the prices of medicines used in two general anesthesia techniques: total intravenous anesthesia (TIVA) and balanced anesthesia with anesthetic gases. We obtained the price of anesthetic procedures from records issued in the final trimesters of 2019, 2020, and 2021 (33, 43, and 29, respectively). Results: a statistically significant difference in prices was seen between periods for both techniques. The price of TIVA in 2019 was R$ 229.30/hour, in 2020 it was R$ 472.13/hour, and in 2021 it was R$ 247.38/hour. For balanced anesthesia, this price was R$ 66.32/hour in 2019, R$ 109.97/hour in 2020, and R$ 90.30/hour in 2021. In a post hoc analysis, significant differences were observed in the hourly prices of TIVA between 2019–2020 (p=0.01) and 2020–2021 (p=0.04); for balanced anesthesia, this was seen only in the 2019–2020 period (p=0.02). Conclusion: this study demonstrated significant increases in the mean prices of general anesthesia administered via intravenous (up to 36.36%) or inhalation (up to 89.47%) routes for exploratory laparotomies performed before and after the beginning of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic in a private hospital in southern Brazil. However, no statistical difference in the hourly prices was observed between 2019 and 2021 for both anesthetic techniques.