India’s National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority is initiating an audit of all angioplasty cases at several hospitals and medical institutions in the country after receiving complaints of overcharging for stents, according to an Indian Express report.
The NPPA’s audit will focus on hospitals that have “inconclusively” responded to the organization, according to the report.
“Hospitals have replied in only half the cases. Audit will be done for all angioplasty cases done during the period — in some cases by the state drug controllers and in others directly by NPPA,” NPPA chair Bhupendra Singh said, according to an IE report.
The Indian regulatory body is looking to complete the process “as soon as possible,” according to the IE report.
The audit comes after the NPPA set price caps on stents in February, a move that has caused some major players in medtech to seek to withdraw their high-end stents from the market.
Late last month, the NPPA rejected applications from Medtronic (NYSE:MDT) and Abbott (NYSE:ABT) to withdraw coronary stents from the region and asked the companies to maintain their supplies of the stents, according to a DNAIndia report.
Earlier in April, Medtronic and Abbott said they would look to withdraw select high-value stents from the Indian market in light of cost caps imposed by the NPPA.Medtronic filed to remove its Resolute Onyx stent from the market, while Abbott filed to remove both its Absorb and Alpine stents.
