Impact of abolishing prescription fees in Scotland on hospital admissions and prescribed medicines: an interrupted time series evaluation.

ABSTRACT:

Objectives

To identify whether the abolition of prescription fees in Scotland resulted in: (1) Increase in the number (cost to NHS) of medicines prescribed for which there had been a fee (inhaled corticosteroids). (2) Reduction in hospital admissions for conditions related to those medications for which there had been a fee (asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD))-when both are compared with prescribed medicines and admissions for a condition (diabetes mellitus) for which prescriptions were historically free.

Design

Natural experimental retrospective general practice level interrupted time series (ITS) analysis using administrative data.

Setting

General practices, Scotland, UK.

Participants

732 (73.6%) general practices across Scotland with vali

SUBMITTER: Williams AJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6303621 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature