Prescribing for painful conditions in adult and elderly patients in general practice: A report from the Møre & Romsdal Prescription Study

Authors

  • Harald A. Nygaard
  • Jørund Straand

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5324/nje.v8i2.449

Abstract

 

Study objectives:

 

 

Design:

 

 

Setting:

 

 

Participants:

 

 

Main results:

 

 

Conclusion:

 

 

Key words:

 

 

pain; analgesics; general practice; epidemiology; NSAIDs; paracetamolThe appropriateness of the GPs prescribing practice for pain often is open to question, and

this especially refers to the widespread use of NSAIDs for chronic musculoskeletal pain in the elderly, the

frequent use of muscle relaxants for chronic musculoskeletal pain in middle aged women, and the prolonged

use of compound analgesics for almost all diagnoses. Plain paracetamol should probably be prescribed

more often for pain in general practice.

The prescribing rates increased with patients' age to the age group 70-79 years. 64% of all

prescriptions were for females, who also received more drugs per prescription than males. With increasing

patients' age, the average amount of drugs issued per prescription increased, more prescriptions were repeat,

and more were issued during indirect GP-patient contacts. The paracetamol/codeine analgesic was the

most frequently prescribed drug, 37.6%, followed by NSAIDs (34.6%) and muscle relaxants (21.8%).

Plain analgesics were only issued in 2.8% of the cases. Chronic musculoskeletal pain was the most

common diagnostic indication (39.2%, for which NSAIDs were most frequently prescribed), followed by

arthritis/ osteoarthritis (18.7%), and back pain (18.0%).

156 GPs.A one month survey where more than 95% of the GPs participated and recorded all patient contacts,

prescriptions, and diagnoses issued to patients 20 years and over.

A prospective prescription study of analgesics due to painful conditions in the county of Møre &

Romsdal, Norway.

To analyse the general practitioners' (GPs') prescribing patterns for NSAIDs, muscle

relaxants, opioids, compound analgesics with codeine, and plain analgesics, issued for: chronic muskuloskeletal

pain, arthritis/osteoarthritis, back pain, headache, casualties, malignancies, and unspecific pain.

ABSTRACT

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Downloads

Published

2009-10-30

How to Cite

Nygaard, H. A., & Straand, J. (2009). Prescribing for painful conditions in adult and elderly patients in general practice: A report from the Møre & Romsdal Prescription Study. Norsk Epidemiologi, 8(2). https://doi.org/10.5324/nje.v8i2.449

Issue

Vol. 8 No. 2 (1998): The epidemiology of ageing

Section

Articles

License

Norsk Epidemiologi licenses all content of the journal under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) licence. This means, among other things, that anyone is free to copy and distribute the content, as long as they give proper credit to the author(s) and the journal. For further information, see Creative Commons website for human readable or lawyer readable versions.

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.

2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.

3. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).