gms | German Medical Science

The benefits of statins have been proven by many clinical trails. As a consequence a growing number of patients with cardio vascular diseases are in treatment with statins. Little is known about the „real life-situation" of statin use within the German population. The aim of the study was to investigate the problem of insufficient persistence of statin prescription on the basis of claims data.

Claims data of the German health insurance company „Gmünder Ersatzkasse (GEK)" of 2002 and 2003 were used as database. In 2003 the GEK insured 1.42 Mio people in total. 1.11 Mio (78,5%) insured persons received at least one prescription. In 2003 the GEK spent 326.47 Mio EURO for prescribed drugs and 15.12 Mio EURO (4,6%) for statins. Analyses were done in MS-ACESS and SAS.

In 2003 48744 persons received at least one prescription for a statin treatment. Comparing the years 2002 and 2003, this figure increased by 11.3% (29872 vs. 33250) for men and by 15.0% (13468 vs. 15494) for women. We identified 10550 persons who started treatment in 2002 and calculated the amount of drug prescribed per patient for the following 365 days or longer. 100 days after the first prescription 71.1% received more than 50 tablets, but only 27.7% received more than 100 tablets. 400 days after the first prescription 46.2% of the patients were prescribed more than 200 pills whereas 11.3% got more than 400 pills on prescription.

The results of the analysis suggest, that the benefit of statin use is diminished for more than half of the patients with statin prescription, because in this cohort 53.8% did not receive the number of tablets which is necessary to continue the medication for at least one year.

Conflict of interest: none