Antipsychotic drug prescription for XXXX in East Asia: rationale for change.

@entity1 @entity1088 @entity146 @entity2644 @entity161 @entity716 @entity952 @entity221
The purpose of this international collaborative study was to investigate the prescription patterns of antipsychotic drugs for @entity161 in East Asia and to analyze factors that affect these patterns. Prescription patterns for @entity1 admitted for treatment of @entity161 were surveyed using a standardized protocol from six East-Asian region/countries: China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Singapore and Taiwan. @entity1 ' social and clinical characteristics, @entity146 symptoms, @entity221 , and adverse effects of medications were systematically assessed and recorded. Prescriptions of the first- and second-generation antipsychotic drugs were compared. A total of 2399 @entity1 were recruited. The second-generation drugs comprised 28.1% of all prescribed antipsychotics, and 46% of the antipsychotic prescriptions were in the context of polypharmacy. The mean dosage of antipsychotics for the whole sample was 675.3 + 645.1 mg @entity2644 equivalents. Japan had a high frequency of prescribing high doses and polypharmacy; Singapore had a high utilization of depot injections while China had a higher prescription of @entity1088 . Using multiple logistic regression analysis, distinctions in the prescription patterns of antipsychotic drugs were found: first-generation drugs were mainly for controlling @entity146 , while second-generation drugs were targeted at the alleviation of positive, negative @entity716 as well as @entity952 in @entity161 . The present collaborative study highlighted differences in the prescription patterns, especially the under-utilization of second-generation antipsychotic drugs in East Asia. The pattern of antipsychotic medication use varied from country to country and is likely to be influenced by the prevailing health-care system, the availability and cost of the drugs.
