ADHD prescriptions increase by 42.28%
There's a lot of information out there that forms a narrative around ADHD and medication in Northern Ireland. This week, I'm keeping it relatively short (but highly nerdy) as I continue to work in the background on creating an online portal.
After doing a bit of a deep dive within the OpenDataNI information on GP Prescribing data for 2018-2023, a few things stood out.
It should be noted for a prescription to appear in this data it needs to have been prescribed by a GP or Nurse (within a main GP Practice), dispensed and submitted to BSO for payment. This does not include private prescriptions. I've taken that data and focused it on the five most widely used ADHD meds (Atomoxetine, Dexamfetamine, Guanfacine, Lisdexamfetamine and Methylphenidate). First, focusing on the number of prescriptions per month for these five:
Comparing the number of prescriptions in 2018 and 2023 shows a 42.28% increase. As you'd imagine there was a year-to-year dip in the increase in 2020, which unscientifically would correlate with a challenge in getting diagnosed during early covid times. The percentage increase was lower in 2023 than in any year outside of 2020, as can be seen by this table, which (also unscientifically), I have no answer for.
| Year | Total Prescriptions | % Increase |
|---|---|---|
| 2018 | 39,122 | N/A |
| 2019 | 42,848 | 9.52% |
| 2020 | 44,130 | 2.99% |
| 2021 | 47,939 | 8.63% |
| 2022 | 52,045 | 8.57% |
| 2023 | 55,661 | 6.95% |
The most widely prescribed of the five drugs in that time period, by quite a long way, is Methylphenidate with 61.75% of the prescriptions across those six years, with 10mg being the most prescribed.
On a pricing point, the OpenDataNI information shows a column for each prescription titled 'actual cost', which is the estimated cost to the Health Service in Northern Ireland for that item.
The total spend by year, broken down into type of drug shows that the estimated cost to health service for those five medications in 2018 was £3.23m, rising to £4.40m in 2023.
The cost for specific drugs to the Health Service is actually much more stable than I expected. For the branded drugs shown in the dataset, it was consistently the exact same cost to Health Service across those six years for all ADHD medication outside of a small minority (and even then variance was minimal).
As an example, the cost to the Health Service in the past six years hasn't changed for 28 tablets of Elvanse 30mg (the subject of this post for private prescriptions) at £58.24.
Key point!
As I've mentioned, I'm not a data scientist. So this data is not reviewed by a university or anyone in data science. I'm working on creating an online resource (which I will be working with experts on) using that OpenDataNI information that's updated monthly and includes a breakdown by GP. So if you're interested in being involved, drop me an email.