title: Prescription pattern of antidepressants in five tertiary care psychiatric centres of India.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Limited data are available on prescription patterns of the antidepressants from India. We studied antidepressants' prescription pattern from five geographically distant tertiary psychiatric care centers of the India.
  
  
  METHODS
  In this cross-sectional study, all patients who attended outpatients department or were admitted in the psychiatry wards at Lucknow, Chandigarh, Tiruvalla, Mumbai and Guwahati on a fixed day, who were using or had been prescribed antidepressant medications, were included. The data were collected on a unified research protocol.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A total of 312 patients were included. Mean age was 39±14.28 yr and 149 (47.76%) were females, 277 (87.5%) were outpatients. Among the patients receiving antidepressants, 150 (48.1%) were of diagnoses other than depression. Diabetes mellitus 18 (5.78%) was the most common co-morbid medical illness. A total of 194 (62.2%) patients were using selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) with escitalopram 114 (36.53%) being the most common antidepressant used. Overall, 272 (87.18%) patients were using newer antidepressants. Thirty (9.62%) were prescribed more than one antidepressant; 159 (50.96%) patients were prescribed hypnotic or sedative medications with clonazepam being the most common (n=116; 37.18%).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  About half of the patients with diagnoses other than depression were prescribed antidepressants. SSRIs were the most common group and escitalopram was the most common medication used. Concomitant use of two antidepressants was infrequent. Hypnotic and sedatives were frequently prescribed along with antidepressants.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, King George's Medical University, Lucknow, India.
authors.forename: Adarsh
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Tripathi
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India.
authors.forename: Ajit
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Avasthi
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Lokmanya Tilak Municipal Medical College, Mumbai, India.
authors.forename: Avinash
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Desousa
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Gauhati Medical College and Hospital, Guwahati, India.
authors.forename: Dipesh
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Bhagabati
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Lokmanya Tilak Municipal Medical College, Mumbai, India.
authors.forename: Nilesh
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Shah
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Pushpagiri Institute of Medical Sciences, Tiruvalla, India.
authors.forename: Roy Abraham
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Kallivayalil
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India.
authors.forename: Sandeep
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Grover
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, King George's Medical University, Lucknow, India.
authors.forename: J K
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Trivedi
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Kobe University Graduate School of Medicine, Fukuoka, Japan.
authors.forename: Naotaka
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Shinfuku
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000928:Antidepressive Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D003920:Diabetes Mellitus / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000453:epidemiology*; D005260:Female; D006778:Hospitals, Psychiatric; D006801:Humans; D007194:India / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D055656:Prescriptions; D017367:Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D062606:Tertiary Care Centers
chemical_list: D000928:Antidepressive Agents; D017367:Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors