Trusted Resources: Evidence & Education
Scientific literature and patient education texts
Physician Prescribing Practices in Sickle Cell Disease
source: American Society of Hematology
year: 2017
authors: Foluso Joy Ogunsile, Zhuo Tony Su, Sophie Lanzkron, Jodi Segal
summary/abstract:Sickle cell disease (SCD) affects approximately 100,000 people in the United States (US) and accounts for 75,000 hospitalizations and $475 million in hospitalization costs per year. There is little information about which physician specialists provide the majority of outpatient care and their prescribing practices for SCD. Many suspect much of adult SCD outpatient care is provided by emergency medicine physicians because of lack of access to high quality care from hematologists and primary care. Here, we evaluate a facet of care in SCD by evaluating the outpatient medications frequently prescribed to SCD patients and the physician specialties most involved in writing those prescriptions.
Methods: We used the National Disease and Therapeutic Index (NDTI), a nationally representative audit of outpatient visits in the continental US conducted by IMS Health. The survey includes approximately 4100 sampled physicians each calendar quarter who provide information about every clinical encounter during 2 consecutive workdays. Physicians are selected by random-stratified sampling by specialty and geographic region from the master lists of the American Medical Association and the American Osteopathic Association. The complex sampling frame allows extrapolation to national estimates for outpatient visits and associated prescriptions. Data for each visit include patient diagnoses based on codes from the International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM), and medications prescribed during these visits. The complex sampling frame allows extrapolation to national estimates for office visits and associated prescriptions. We analyzed medications prescribed for the years 2012 through 2015 for patients with SCD. Our analyses included all visits by patients with a recorded SCD diagnosis (International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision [ICD-9] codes 282.41–282.42, 282.60–282.64, 282.68, or 282.69). We used descriptive statistics to examine the counts of prescriptions. We aggregated quarterly data from 2012 to 2015 to present annual trends. With linear regression analysis, we assessed the rate of change of prescriptions each year.
organization: Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, Baltimore; Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore; Johns Hopkins University, School of Medicine, Baltimoreread more
Related Content
-
Cecelia R. Valrie, PhDDr. Cecelia Valrie is a developmental-he...
-
Duke University Comprehensive Sickle Cell CenterHematologists at the Duke University Com...
-
Wally Smith, MDWally Smith is Professor of Internal Med...
-
Adult Sickle Cell Clinic at UAMSThe University of Arkansas for Medical S...
-
Men with sickle cell disease show significant concerns over safety while being treated for vaso-occlusive crises: pr...Background: We undertook a large multisi...
-
2019 Annual Sickle Cell Symposium – Sickle Cell: Past Present and FutureDRAFT Agenda 5:00pm Registration, netwo...
-
Music therapy helps relieve pain in adults with sickle cell disease, pilot trial suggestsMusic therapy can help ease pain in ad...
To improve your experience on this site, we use cookies. This includes cookies essential for the basic functioning of our website, cookies for analytics purposes, and cookies enabling us to personalize site content. By clicking on 'Accept' or any content on this site, you agree that cookies can be placed. You may adjust your browser's cookie settings to suit your preferences. More Information
The cookie settings on this website are set to "allow cookies" to give you the best browsing experience possible. If you continue to use this website without changing your cookie settings or you click "Accept" below then you are consenting to this.