title: Patterns of analgesic prescribing in a South African primary care setting.
abstract: The primary aim of this study was to assess patterns of prescribing of analgesic medications in a primary care setting in South Africa. Medication records of 47,103 patients for the year 1995 were retrospectively reviewed. Analgesic agents represented 12.3% of the total number and 14.2% of the total cost of all the products prescribed. Analgesic products were prescribed to nearly three times as many females as males. Most analgesic prescriptions were for non-opioid analgesics (93.8%). More than half (56.8%) of all the prescriptions for analgesics were available without a prescription from a medical practitioner. Analgesic prescription diminished as age increased. The high prescribing rate of analgesics to children younger than 10 years was a cause for concern. Furthermore, meprobamate-containing analgesics accounted for 12.2% of central nervous system drugs and 28.1% of the non-opioid analgesics that were prescribed. This finding was also a cause for concern due to the dependence-producing properties of meprobamate. It was concluded that the pharmacist has an important role to fulfil in the counselling of patients with respect to the use of analgesic products.
authors.affiliation: Pharmacy Department, University of Port Elizabeth, South Africa.
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Truter
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000700:Analgesics / Q000191:economics / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003157:Community Pharmacy Services; D016527:Drug Costs; D011307:Drug Prescriptions / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D004366:Nonprescription Drugs / Q000627:therapeutic use; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012737:Sex Factors; D013019:South Africa
chemical_list: D000700:Analgesics; D004366:Nonprescription Drugs