Prescription drugs represent a growing cost in the provision of health care. New drugs are now used in treatments for which older drugs were not developed. In addition, existing drug treatments are being replaced by newer, sometimes more costly, drugs.
We divided new drug introductions into two steps: (1) first-in-class drugs to reach the market and (2) later follow-on drugs in established therapeutic categories (i.e., with previously existing USC codes). In this research, our analysis used two logistic regression models: one for first-in-class drugs and a second for follow-on drugs. First-in-class drugs represent a potentially [...]
We examined the prescribing behavior of 3,646 physicians in relation to the introduction of 32 new drugs on the market from 1997 through 2000. The data reflected writing prescriptions for one drug per physician; the assignment of a particular drug to a physician was determined by leters of the U.S. prescribing physicians, the study population [...]
INTRODUCTION As total expenditures related to health care grow each year, pharmaceuticals play an ever-increasing role in medical care. Prescription drugs now account for a larger percentage of health care costs than ever before. Physicians remain the gatekeepers to the widespread use of a new drug. Although a fairly large amount of research has focused [...]
