Comparison of drug prescribing before and during the COVID-19 pandemic: A cross-national European study
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic had an impact on many aspects of life including health care. We assumed that also drug prescribing would be affected.
Our aim was to describe changes in prescription drug dispensing in the outpatient sector during the first year of the pandemic across Europe. We used large data sets on dispensed volumes of medicines and their pack sizes in eight European countries (five whole countries and three represented by one region each), comparing the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic and the preceding 3 years.
In all countries/regions we observed a substantial decrease in dispensed volumes of antibiotics for systemic use (i.e., usually oral antibiotics) and nasal preparations. In March 2020 we observed an increase in dispensed volume of medicines in all countries/regions but Slovenia, where this effect occurred only after the end of the lockdown connected to the first wave of the pandemic.
Increases in average pack size dispensed were rather mild and exceeded 5% only in three of the countries/regions. Although the first year of the pandemic brought substantial changes in dispensed volumes of medicines, it is reassuring that medicines for treating common chronic conditions were usually little affected.