AVERAGE DAILY CONSUMPTION OF CELECOXIB AND ROFECOXIB BASED ON A LARGE PHARMACY CLAIMS DATABASE IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Background: Since 1999, two Coxibs, celecoxib and rofecoxib, have been marketed in the United States. At the time of this study in May 2001, these drugs were approved in the U.S. for osteoarthritis (OA) [celecoxib (100 mg twice daily or 200 mg once daily), rofecoxib (12.5 mg or 25 mg once daily)], rheumatoid arthritis (RA) [celecoxib (100 mg or 200 mg twice daily)] and acute pain (rofecoxib 50 mg once daily up to 5 days).Objectives: To assess the average daily consumption of celecoxib and rofecoxib used in the U.S.Methods: This study used the Quintiles Informatics prescription database, a pharmacy claims database that, as of May 2001, contained >800 million prescriptions from >100 million patients in the U.S. from approximately 39,000 pharmacies nationwide. All individuals with at least 90 days of supply of Coxibs between 1 June 2000 and 31 May 2001 were identified. Analyses were conducted for (1) all patients, (2) patients with OA based on the subset of the database containing patient medical information, and (3) patients receiving prescriptions from rheumatologists. All dosage strengths of the two Coxibs were included in the analyses.Results: A total of 6,008,906 prescriptions (Rx) were identified during the 1-year period; 46% were for rofecoxib and 54% for celecoxib. 80.1% of all rofecoxib Rx were for the 25 mg strength and 81.0% of all celecoxib Rx were for the 200 mg strength. 68.0% of all Coxib Rx were for females and 42.7% were for patients aged 65 years or older; these percentages were higher for lower Coxib dose strengths across all 3 analyses. Data on average daily consumption are summarized in the table below. If the most widely used strengths for celecoxib (200mg) and rofecoxib (25mg) were used as reference doses [(daily milligrams used)/(most widely used strength), defined as Dacon in this study], patients on celecoxib received higher dosage units per day than those on rofecoxib. Similar patterns of daily consumptions for the two Coxibs were found among patients in different age or sex groups and patients treated by primary care physicians. All Patients Patients with OA Rheum Patients Rofecoxib Celecoxib Rofecoxib Celecoxib Rofecoxib Celecoxib Daily milligrams 32.8 303.9 28.2 276.2 27.1 332.7 Pills/Rx 43.1 56.6 35.4 47.3 37.4 58.9 Days/Rx 32.3 32.6 32.3 32.6 33.7 33.5 Pill/day 1.33 1.74 1.10 1.45 1.11 1.76 Dacon 1.29 1.52 1.13 1.34 1.08 1.66 Conclusion: This study found that across all subgroup analyses, patients on celecoxib used more pills per day than those on rofecoxib. These findings support further evaluation of comparative efficacy and pharmacoeconomics of the Coxibs in actual use settings.Citation: , volume , supplement , year 2002, page Session: Health services, economics and outcome research