The Medicines Utilization Monitoring Centre (OsMed) ensures the monitoring of consumption and expenditure of medicines supplied by the National Health Service in direct and per conto distribution for outpatient and inpatient assistance. It also analyses the consumption and expenditure of Class C medicines purchased directly by the citizen, in addition to the private purchase of Class A-H medicines.

The main aims of OsMed are:

• describe changes in the use of medicines;
• correlate public health problems and the use of medicinal products or therapeutic categories;
• promote the dissemination of information on the use of medicinal products;
• compare the consumption of medicinal products in Italy with that of the different regions;
• provide ideas for correlating the prevalence of pathologies in the territory with the corresponding use of medicinal products and propose the interpretation of the main factors that influence variability in prescription.

The Monitoring Centre analyses and integrates data collected from different sources:

• the central database of medicinal products for medicines purchased from public health facilities and for private purchase paid by the citizen (Decree of the Ministry of Health of 15 July 2004 and subsequent amendments);

• the information flow of direct and per conto distribution for pharmaceutical services carried out in direct and per conto distribution of pharmacies and for the purchase of medicines purchased by private structures and subsequently reimbursed by the National Health Service as a surplus over the tariff of the DRG (Decree of the Ministry of Health of 31 July 2007 and subsequent amendments);

• the information flow of hospital consumption for medicinal products consumed within the hospital (Decree of the Ministry of Health of 4 February 2009 and subsequent amendments);

• the information flow for the transmission of pharmaceutical prescriptions for pharmaceutical prescriptions paid by the NHS (pursuant to paragraph 5 of art. 50 of Decree Law No. 269 of 30 September 2003, converted, with modification by Law No. 326 of 24 November 2003, and subsequent amendments);

• The so-called Osmed flow of pharmaceutical services provided through public and private pharmacies affiliated with the NHS, which was implemented with art. 18 of the Decree of the Ministry of Health No. 245 of 20 September 2004.