Analysis of patient drug usage trends in the POYC scheme

Abstract

The Pharmacy of your Choice (POYC) scheme is part of the national health service in Malta. This pharmaceutical service provides free medicines and pharmaceutical devices for chronic diseases through private community pharmacies. The aim of this study was to analyse drug usage data within the POYC system using a community pharmacy in Malta as an example. POYC patients who are registered with the pharmacy were selected randomly using an online random number generator. Patient details and drug usage history were recorded by accessing the POYC data from a centralized computer system. Drugs were categorized into their respective therapeutic class based on the outpatients formulary list from the Ministry of Health. Drug usage data was obtained for 200 patients (107 female, 93 male, mean age 66 years (13 to 89 years). Central nervous and cardiovascular system were the classes with the most number of drugs used. The 10 most commonly used drugs among POYC patients are simvastatin (74), amlodipine (62), aspirin (56), perindopril (56), valsartan (53), metformin (43), omeprazole (43), atorvastatin (34), bendroflumethiazide (32), and salbutamol (30). There has been an increase in the usage for 8 out of 10 drugs. The greatest rise observed was of atorvastatin, with 2,856 tablets dispensed in 2019 from 1232 dispensed tablets in 2017, a 131.8% increase. Omeprazole and salbutamol have a 26.5% and 21.6% increase, respectively. The quantity dispensed for simvastatin decreased from 4,956 in 2017 to 4,564 tablets in 2019. Dispensing of aspirin has been steady with 1976 for each year over the past 3 years. From total number of potential drug interactions, the combination of amlodipine and simvastatin was the highest in number. The study captures perspective trends of drug usage within the national health service.