Almost 32,000 beneficiaries, who are living with asthma and are enrolled with the National Health Fund (NHF), now have access to subsidies for spacers and masks, which are respiratory devices to help deliver asthma medication more efficiently to the lungs.
The NHF subsidy for a spacer is $604 and $371 for a mask while the subsidy for a combination of the two is $975.
Spacers and masks are used by children and adults, along with their inhaler, to facilitate the effective delivery of the doses of medication to the lungs.
These devices are particularly beneficial to children and the elderly, as they usually have great difficulty mastering the inhaler technique, which can lead to wastage of the medication and life threatening complications, due to poor asthma control.
The spacers and masks being offered on the NHF programme are Volumatic Spacer, for adults; Zerostat-LAS Spacer; Spacer-H2K; Able Spacer; Able Spacer Mask, for infants; Able Spacer Mask, for children; Able Spacer Mask, for adults; Mask-H2K, for babies; Mask-LASm, for babies,; Aerochamber Plus Spacer and Mask, for infants; Aerochamber Plus Spacer and Mask, paediatric and Aerochamber Adult Spacer and Mouthpiece.
“We decided to provide subsidies for Spacers and Masks used by asthmatics in the delivery of inhaled medication based on requests we have been receiving and on the recommendation from the Medical Review Committee of the Board,” said Hugh Lawson, Chief Executive Office of the NHF.
According to him, he anticipates that the addition of these benefits will have a positive impact on the treatment of asthma and improve the quality of life for asthma patients.
In 2010, beneficiaries enrolled for asthma filled just under 45,000 prescriptions using their NHF card and NHF provided a subsidy of approximately $48 million for these prescriptions.
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