Mark Stuart, BPharm PGDipCDDS DipBotMed MRPharmS
Maria Skouroliakou, Director of Pharmacy, Athens 2004 Olympic Games
Published in the Pharmaceutical Journal UK, 2004
The Polyclinic Pharmacy in the Athens Olympic Village opened on July 30 to provide the pharmacy requirements of over 17 000 athletes, team officials and technical officials from 202 countries. The Pharmacy provided medicines to residents of the Olympic Village and acted as a central point of organisation, coordination and distribution of drugs to the satellite pharmacies at each of the Olympic sporting venues. Pharmacists worked alongside other medical experts in a closely-knit environment to provide a world class level of medical care to the ‘Olympic Family’.
In addition to the pharmacy, the Polyclinic also contained a comprehensive range of medical services and specialties which included: sports medicine, medical imaging, podiatry, physiotherapy, dentistry, physiotherapy, pathology, eye services including opticians and ophthalmologists, orthopaedics, and gynaecology. With its contemporary design, brand new high-tech medical equipment and marble floors throughout, the Polyclinic functioned as a complete luxury hospital and state-of-the-art sports medicine clinic.
An extraordinary total of 3000 medical staff was required to run the medical programme for the Games. This included 400 specialist doctors, 400 nurses, 400 physical therapists, 200 masseurs, 40 dentists, 30 opticians and 20 podiatrists. 170 ambulances and 3 helicopters were also on-the-ready to cope with any medical emergencies that arose. The medical services within the Olympic Village worked closely with the Greek Ministry of Health and Welfare to ensure that patients requiring additional medical treatment other than that provided in the Polyclinic could be transferred to a network of dedicated Olympic hospitals. The Polyclinic pharmacy was staffed by 12 pharmacists and 10 pharmacy students from Athens University. There were 2 shifts during the day from 8am to 3pm and 3pm to 10pm; an on-call pharmacy service was provided overnight.
A pharmacy guide outlining the Games formulary and prescribing procedures was supplied to each participating nation. The formulary included information about the status of each drug in sport and information about notification procedures for restricted drugs requiring a therapeutic use exemption, such as beta-2-agonists and corticosteroids. Since many of the large teams bought their own supply of medicines, the formulary also contained information about the importation of drugs into Greece. Eight months before the Games, each National Olympic Committee was requested to declare all medications they planned to bring into the country to ensure that there could be no inadvertent breach of customs and importation laws. Special allowances were made for visiting team doctors to prescribe only for members of their own country’s team for the Olympic period.
All medicines and medical services were provided completely free of charge to the athletes and officials. 270 different medicines were listed on the formulary and available for prescribing. Although a considerable amount of drug stock was donated by pharmaceutical companies, the total cost of drugs for the pharmacy came to 240,000 Euro.
The computer dispensing system was custom designed for the Athens Games and seemed to combine the most successful elements of the dispensing programmes from the Sydney Olympics and Manchester Commonwealth Games. The system was linked to the athlete accreditation system and was able to display all the details of the athlete by simply entering the athlete’s identification number. The system was also linked to the other medical systems within the Polyclinic to provide the pharmacist with detailed information about the prescribing doctor and the Polyclinic admission details. The system would alert the dispensing pharmacist if any prohibited or restricted drug was dispensed and would print a duplicate prescription for the athlete to keep.
A total of around 100 to 150 prescriptions were dispensed daily. Similar to previous games, anti-inflammatory drugs including diclofenac were most frequently prescribed for soft-tissue injury. Antibiotics and loratadine were also in high demand, as were simple eye drops for dry, irritated eyes; the consequence of 36 degree temperatures on some days and a dry and dusty atmosphere. Simple analgesic medications were dispensed by prescription only and fast-movers included paracetamol and orphenadrine. The Polyclinic Pharmacy was also responsible for distributing 130 000 free Durex condoms and 30 000 sachets of personal lubricant. Pharmacy involvement in safe-sex campaigns is becoming a tradition at international games.
The Olympic Pharmacy was given access to the recently launched Medicines Complete by Pharmaceutical Press for the period of the Olympic and Paralympic Games. This comprehensive electronic information package could be used for the identification of drugs and product names from foreign countries and allow pharmacy staff access to information on a range of nutritional supplements frequently used by athletes.
To cope with the increased pharmacy demands of millions of visitors to Athens, the Olympic Organising Committee and pharmacists representing the pharmaceutical industry and local businesses came to an agreement for the operation and restocking of essential medicines around Athens during the Olympic period. The number of pharmacies open on the weekends and overnight were increased especially around Olympic venues, downtown Athens and the port of Piraeus. Provisions for the restocking of pharmacies during evening hours were implemented.
The polyclinic pharmacy will remain open until October 1st to serve the athletes and officials of the Paralympic Games.