A survey of drug utilization in psychiatric hospitals in Japan: the basic analysis of the current status of prescription patterns

Although concern about the prescription pattern of psychotropics is growing, there have been very few surveys in Japan. In this survey conducted in 1993, prescription data, patient characteristics, etc. were collected for 2,395 inpatients from 18 psychiatric hospitals. Their mean age was 48.4 (S.D. = 13.6). Of these patients, 1,818 (75.9%) were diagnosed with schizophrenia, 115 (4.8%) with mood disorder, and 102 (4.3%) with mental retardation. The results were as follows. 1) They were prescribed an average of 10.1 different drugs: of these, 5.6 were various psychotropics (2.6 neuroleptics, 1.2 antiparkinsonian drugs, 1.0 hypnotics). 2) The mean daily dose of antipsychotics was 1,082 mg of chlorpromazine equivalent. 3) The most commonly prescribed neuroleptic was haloperidol (53.2% of the total patients) followed by levomepromazine (48.7%), chlorpromazine (24.8%), bromperidol (18.7%), and zotepine (18.3%).