Long-term trends in use of and expenditures for cardiovascular medications in Canada.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Medication expenditures have become the fastest growing sector of costs within the Canadian health care system. Evaluation of the use of cardiovascular medications is important to determine the magnitude of the growth, to identify which medications dominate the landscape and to detect interprovincial differences in utilization. We describe long-term trends in the use of and expenditures for cardiovascular medications in Canada, by drug class and by province.

Methods

For these analyses, we used volume and expenditure data related to prescriptions for cardiovascular medications obtained from IMS Health Canada's CompuScript Audit database for the period 1996-2006. Here, we describe national and provincial patterns of utilization and expenditures for specified classes

SUBMITTER: Jackevicius CA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2704416 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature