Research Article Open Access

Morbidity Profile and Drug Utilization Pattern in Allergic Diseases in Skin Outpatients in a Tertiary Care Teaching Hospital at Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India

Abstract

Pharmaco-epidemiological studies in allergic skin conditions are very few. To analyze and assess, common allergic skin conditions and drug prescribing patterns to increase the rational prescribing. Prescriptions of 450 patients attending dermatology OPD of SGRRIM&HS, Dehradun were evaluated, for common skin conditions and drug utilization pattern for 6 months from January 2013 to June 2013 using WHO drug use indicators. A total of 450 prescriptions were analyzed, male: female ratio was 1:1.09, mean age of the patients 30.29±1.24yrs, 380 (84.45%) belongs to middle socio-economic group and 103 (22.89%) patients had h/o allergic diseases. Disease pattern observed in this study were contact dermatitis 203 (45.11%), urticaria 147 (32.67%), atopic dermatitis 100 (22.22%) respectively. Total 1255 drugs were used, oral formulations 680 (54.18%), topical 575 (45.82%), FDCs (fixed dose combination) 466 (37.13%), 2.79 drugs/prescription were prescribed. Antihistaminic 234 (34.41%) were most commonly used oral drug, 466 (81.04%), topical drugs were prescribed mostly as combination of steroids, antifungal and antibiotics. Antifungals 45 (41.28%) were the most frequent single topical preparations used. All the drugs were prescribed by brand names. Though, dose/strength for topical drugs was inadequately mentioned but chances of error were negligible as the brand had availability in single dose/strength in pharmacy. It is the need of the time, prescribers should be made aware of the demerits of irrational prescribing and they should be cautious and vigilant whenever prescribing FDCs.

Shaktibala Dutta, Mirza Atif Beg , Shantosh Kumar, Shalu Bawa, Anil Kumar Mehta, Mohammad Anjoom, and Saubhagya Sindhu

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