Anand Medical& General store - Mumbai

Good experience

They are openly cheating everybody in the name of "generics" and not offering low-price drugs. Note: Patel Chemist store, which is one shop away is also owned by same guy and have this policy of fooling every1 This week my parents visited specialist doctor (Dr. Anand Ambesange) as part of their regular follow-up on chronic illness. Our Dr. recommended medicine course for the next 3 months, and my parents went to Chemist shop (Patel Chemist, Charkop, Kandivali-W, Mumbai) which is just next shop to doctor's clinic. The Chemist shopkeeper suggested to my parents that they can buy "Generic" medicines, which has the same composition of what Dr. has recommended, but will be avlbl at 20% discount to MRP. My parents willingly agreed, provided there is no compromise on medicinal effects. All went well, until as a random check-up later that night I found something misleading.. Dr. had recommended a tablet called Atocor 20 ( manufactured by Dr. Reddy's), which Chemist replaced with Rosubest 20(manufactured by Cadila). MRP of Atocor is Rs 189 for 14 tablets in a strip (Rs 13.5 per tablet). However, Rosubest packet costs MRP 232 for 10 tablets, and even after 20% discount, per tablet cost works out to be Rs 18.6, much more then what was recommended. Similar was the case with 4 other medicines that he gave as generics. The point is while they are giving discount, the MRP of these products are non-transparent and perhaps higher then what Dr. is suggesting. And general public (espclly sr. citizens, poor and uneducated, who cannot do this math or cannot keep comparing medicine content/ MRPs) are falling victim to these common practise. When next morning I explained the details to Mr.Patel (owner of shop), he immediately offered to payback ~Rs 600 he had charged extra on bill value of ~Rs 4300. But note he had no remorse for his cheating, and was arrogant trying to put blame on us. When I brought this to the notice of our Dr. Anand, he co-operated superbly, saying this needs to be complained to Drug controller and his chemist shop should be closed immediately for looting innocent public. Further, he says ideally the generics given by Chemist should have been sold at 20-30% of MRP (i.e at 70-80% discount to MRP, which has left me shocked as generally we have been buying all medicines at MRP for so many years now). I think govt. policies on these issues are not proper as: a) there is no classification for common public to understand on what is a "generic" drug and original branded drug, and b) why MRPs need to be printed so high when they are to be sold at massive discounts. To conclude, when Chemist offers to give Generic medicine, first check composition of both medicines if ingredients are same --> then check what is the per tablet cost of Dr. recommendation --> and compare with per tablet cost of generic medicine. Only if generic is coming at substantial discount to branded drug, then go for it. Basically, checking only MRPs may not be effective. Separately, for the low-earning families, we should be aware that Central govt's Jan Ausadhi store sells generics at really deep discount price, and probably they are much better place to buy actual generics. I could have stopped this agitation when Patel Chemist offered to payback what was charged extra to my parents. But the reason for this post is to spread awareness (as I see lot of Chemist shops having huge boards saying they offer low-price generics, not sure if they really give out generics). Pls share this info. as much possible on social media and am hoping atleast some of us become more aware of his cheating.