TABLE 2.
Prescriptions and daily oral corticosteroid (OCS) dosage
| UK | Italy | France | Germany (GPs) | Germany (pulmonologists) | ||||||
| High OCS | Low OCS | High OCS | Low OCS | High OCS | Low OCS | High OCS | Low OCS | High OCS | Low OCS | |
| Patients n | 28 774 | 95 748 | 6679 | 22 503 | 9751 | 38 834 | 4330 | 6571 | 1712 | 2279 |
| Number of OCS prescriptions per year of follow-up | 3.0±3.4 | 0.6±0.7 | 1.7±2.1 | 0.5±0.6 | 1.5±1.3 | 0.6±0.6 | 1.2±1.5 | 0.5±0.6 | 1.0±1.3 | 0.5±0.6 |
| Number of OCS prescriptions per year of follow-up | ||||||||||
| ≥1 | 72.2 | 15.5 | 51.1 | 12.9 | 57.5 | 17.9 | 35.5 | 14.4 | 33.1 | 10.8 |
| ≥2 | 43.6 | 3.6 | 24.2 | 3.2 | 22.7 | 4.3 | 18.1 | 4.1 | 14.5 | 3 |
| ≥3 | 28.6 | 1.3 | 14.5 | 1.4 | 10.1 | 1.4 | 10.7 | 1.4 | 7.4 | 1.4 |
| ≥4 | 21.1 | 0.6 | 9.8 | 0.6 | 5.0 | 0.4 | 6.1 | 0.4 | 3.8 | 0.3 |
| Median gap days between prescriptions# | 25.1±7.6 | 26.9±6.8 | 27.8±5.5 | 77.7±24.3 | 85.5±20.5 | |||||
| Average daily OCS dosage mg | ||||||||||
| Mean±sd | 2.2±3.2 | 0.3±0.3 | 1.3±1.8 | 0.2±0.2 | 1.5±2.7 | 0.3±0.5 | 2.2±3.3 | 0.3±0.3 | 1.8±2.6 | 0.3±0.4 |
| Median | 1.1 | 0.2 | 0.7 | 0.1 | 0.9 | 0.2 | 1.0 | 0.2 | 0.9 | 0.2 |
| Average daily OCS dosage¶ | ||||||||||
| <2.5 mg | 76.4 | 99.7 | 86.8 | 99.9 | 87.7 | 99.4 | 75.7 | 99.5 | 79.1 | 99.2 |
| 2.5–5 mg | 12.6 | 0.3 | 8.5 | 0.1 | 8.3 | 0.5 | 13.2 | 0.5 | 12.9 | 0.8 |
| 5–7.5 mg | 0 | 0 | 3.0 | 0 | 1.9 | 0 | 5.2 | 0 | 4.1 | 0 |
| ≥7.5 mg | 0 | 0 | 1.7 | 0 | 2.1 | 0 | 5.9 | 0 | 3.9 | 0 |
Data are presented as mean±sd or %, unless otherwise stated. UK: United Kingdom; GPs: general physicians. #: during the first-year post-high OCS use date; ¶: in the UK, the percentages of patients receiving average daily OCS dosages of 5.0–5.7 mg and ≥7.5 mg are suppressed because of small-count rules to prevent disclosure of an individual's information.