Use of analgesics in intentional drug overdose presentations to hospital before and after the withdrawal of distalgesic from the Irish market

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dc.contributor.authorCorcoran, Paul
dc.contributor.authorReulbach, Udo
dc.contributor.authorKeeley, Helen S.
dc.contributor.authorPerry, Ivan J.
dc.contributor.authorHawton, Keith
dc.contributor.authorArensman, Ella
dc.contributor.funderMedical and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MRHA), UKen
dc.contributor.funderHealth Service Executive, Irelanden
dc.date.accessioned2016-06-15T14:24:57Z
dc.date.available2016-06-15T14:24:57Z
dc.date.issued2010-03-18
dc.date.updated2014-10-29T12:14:56Z
dc.description.abstractBACKGROUND: Distalgesic, the prescription-only analgesic compound of paracetamol (325 mg) and dextropropoxyphene (32.5 mg) known as co-proxamol in the UK, was withdrawn from the Irish market as of January 2006. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of the withdrawal of distalgesic in terms of intentional drug overdose (IDO) presentations to hospital emergency departments (EDs) nationally. METHODS: A total of 42,849 IDO presentations to 37 of the 40 hospitals EDs operating in Ireland in 2003-2008 were recorded according to standardised procedures. Data on sales of paracetamol-containing drugs to retail pharmacies for the period 1998-2008 were obtained from IMS Health. RESULTS: The withdrawal of distalgesic from the Irish market resulted in an immediate reduction in sales to retail pharmacies from 40 million tablets in 2005 to 500,000 tablets in 2006 while there was a 48% increase in sales of other prescription compound analgesics. The rate of IDO presentations to hospital involving distalgesic in 2006- 2008 was 84% lower than in the three years before it was withdrawn (10.0 per 100,000). There was a 44% increase in the rate of IDO presentations involving other prescription compound analgesics but the magnitude of this rate increase was five times smaller than the magnitude of the decrease in distalgesic-related IDO presentations. There was a decreasing trend in the rate of presentations involving any paracetamol-containing drug that began in the years before the distalgesic withdrawal. CONCLUSIONS: The withdrawal of distalgesic has had positive benefits in terms of IDO presentations to hospital in Ireland and provides evidence supporting the restriction of availability of means as a prevention strategy for suicidal behaviour.en
dc.description.sponsorshipHealth Service Executive, Ireland (HSE National Office for Suicide Prevention); Medical and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, UK (MHRA)en
dc.description.statusPeer revieweden
dc.description.versionPublished Versionen
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdfen
dc.identifier.articleid6
dc.identifier.citationCorcoran, P., Reulbach, U., Keeley, H. S., Perry, I. J., Hawton, K. and Arensman, E. (2010) 'Use of analgesics in intentional drug overdose presentations to hospital before and after the withdrawal of distalgesic from the Irish market'. BMC Clinical Pharmacology, 10, 6. http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1472-6904-10-6en
dc.identifier.doi10.1186/1472-6904-10-6
dc.identifier.endpage6(8)en
dc.identifier.issn1472-6904
dc.identifier.journaltitleBMC Clinical Pharmacologyen
dc.identifier.startpage6(1)en
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10468/2744
dc.identifier.volume10en
dc.language.isoenen
dc.publisherBioMed Centralen
dc.rights© 2010 Corcoran et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.en
dc.rights.urihttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0en
dc.subjectAnalgesic agenten
dc.subjectParacetamolen
dc.subjectIntentional drug overdose (IDO)en
dc.subjectDistalgesicen
dc.subjectCo-proxamolen
dc.subjectDrug legislationen
dc.subjectSuicideen
dc.subjectSuicide attempten
dc.titleUse of analgesics in intentional drug overdose presentations to hospital before and after the withdrawal of distalgesic from the Irish marketen
dc.typeArticle (peer-reviewed)en
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