A Prospective Study On Prescribing Pattern and Cost Impact of Antidiabetic Drugs

Diabetes mellitus is a chronic disorder emerging as a major health problem which increases the rate of morbidity and mortality.  The study was a prospective, cross sectional, observational study conducted on both inpatients and outpatients of a tertiary hospital in Bangalore, who were diagnosed with type 2 Diabetes mellitus after obtaining the approval from the institutional review board. A suitable data collection form was designed to collect and document the data pertaining to sociodemographic details, treatment , including costs for patients with Diabetes mellitus. Diabetes mellitus was observed to be higher in patients in the age group of 45-64 years, affecting (61%) males and (48.02%) females. We observed that 44 (14.66%) patients were treated with insulin+oral hypoglycemic agents, 159 (53%) were treated with only Insulin while 97(32.66%) patients were prescribed only oral hypoglycemic agents. In our study average number of drugs per prescription was found to be 5.54 ±1.59, and average number of antidiabetic drugs was found to be 1.14±0.59. The mean prescription cost of inpatients for 5 days was found to be 679.24INR for diabetic drugs. For outpatients the mean prescription cost of antidiabetic drugs for 5 days was 98.73INR for antidiabetic drugs. This study has provided baseline data regarding the prescribing pattern in diabetes patients. The use of drugs on the essential medicine list to reduce the cost of treatment and to improve compliance of the patients must be encouraged.