Publication:

Drug utilization study of patients with dermatophytosis attending dermatology outpatient department in tertiary care teaching hospital in Central India

Background Dermatophytosis is a common fungal infection in India, with prevalence ranging from 36.6% to 78.4%. Treatment options include topical and systemic antifungal agents such as amphotericin B, clotrimazole, miconazole, luliconazole, itraconazole, and terbinafine. With the availability of newer antifungal drugs, a drug utilization study is necessary to understand prescription patterns and promote rational use.

Methods This is a retrospective observational study conducted among the patients attending outpatient department of dermatology of Indira Gandhi Government Medical College and Mayo Hospital. Prescription of patients with diagnosis of tinea were collected using efficient digital database. These prescriptions were then analysed depending on their demographic profile, treatment and then results were evaluated with the help of MS Excel and results presented as percentage and proportion.

Results Total 3701 patients had tinea with 1658 females and 2043 males with majority of patients from 16 to 30 years of age. 81% medicine were prescribed using brand names with prescription containing maximum antifungal drugs followed by antihistaminic drugs. Most common drug prescribed was terbinafine (29%), followed by luliconazole (27.46%) and itraconazole (17%). Most commonly topical antifungal agents were prescribed as cream (35.80%) followed by as lotion (26.26%).

Conclusions Drug utilisation pattern study like this is very important for studying the varying prescription pattern in treatment of dermatophytosis and to make a first step towards uniform and rational drug prescription.