Age and sex patterns of drug prescribing in a defined American population.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

To describe the age and sex patterns of drug prescribing in Olmsted County, Minnesota.

Patients and methods

Population-based drug prescription records for the Olmsted County population in 2009 were obtained using the Rochester Epidemiology Project medical records linkage system (n=142,377). Drug prescriptions were classified using RxNorm codes and were grouped using the National Drug File-Reference Terminology.

Results

Overall, 68.1% of the population (n=96,953) received a prescription from at least 1 drug group, 51.6% (n=73,501) received prescriptions from 2 or more groups, and 21.2% (n=30,218) received prescriptions from 5 or more groups. The most commonly prescribed drug groups in the entire population were penicillins and β-lactam antimicrobials (17%; n=

SUBMITTER: Zhong W 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3754826 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature