RESUMO
BACKGROUND: Milk is considered to be a balanced food rich in fats, proteins, vitamins, and minerals, which is complete nutrition in a balanced proportion. However, most of milk sold in India does not match standards laid down by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India. OBJECTIVE: The objective was to understand the perception of community regarding the acceptance of packaged and unpackaged milk, to assess the quality of milk with respect to adulterants, and to assess the difference in the quality of milk at a level of vendor/hawker and end user. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 100 households in the peri-urban area of Kangan Heri, Delhi. A structured questionnaire and checklist were used for data collection. Purposive sampling was used. The analysis was done with the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences version 22. Descriptive statistics and cross tabulation were used. RESULTS: A total of 22.5% respondents preferred packaged milk over unpackaged milk. Only 8% of packaged milk samples contained no adulterant. Majority of the respondents were preferred unpacked milk for daily consumption. CONCLUSION: Community perceives good taste as traits of good quality milk followed by good smell, digestibility, and color and economical. The presence of neutralizer in packaged milk followed by detergent and urea. There was no difference in the presence of adulterants in packaged milk at the level of end user or vendor. There is a slight difference in the presence of adulterants in unpackaged milk at level of end user.
RESUMO
BACKGROUND: Medicines are an integral part of the health system and the accessibility hugely depends on affordability and availability of medicines. Oral health is an integral component of overall well-being but is ironically often one of the most neglected areas of healthcare. There is paucity of data on the pharmaceutical cost components of dental disease, so this study aims to address this lacuna on the pricing of medicines. OBJECTIVE: This research study can be considered a partial economic evaluation that focuses on an estimation of costs associated with medicines used in the treatment of selected oral diseases to suggest policy measures to reduce out-of-pocket expenditure on medicines. METHODS: Using cost analysis research design on the PharmaTrac dataset and cross-comparing it with public procurement rates of the Rajasthan Medical Services Corporation (RMSC) indicates that the pharmaceutical cost of treating caries and periodontitis is approximately three times higher if median retail prices are considered instead of RMSC public procurement costs. RESULTS: Medicine cost of treating a single episode of caries or periodontitis using RMSC medicine rates at all levels of care is approximately 1.9-2.5 times lower than retail prices of the same formulations. CONCLUSION: Our results strongly suggest that centralized public procurement of dental medicines with an efficient monitoring and control can reduce the out-of-pocket expenditure.