Antidepressants
(asked on 20th February 2017) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many prescriptions for anti-depressant medication were issued in England in each of the last 10 years to (a) adults and (b) children.
The data available has no patient level information; therefore the breakdown of prescriptions for adults and children is not available.
Antidepressant drugs are classified in the British National Formulary (BNF) section 4.3 antidepressant drugs using the classification system prior to edition 70.
Data on the number of prescription items for antidepressants is provided below.
Total number of antidepressant prescription items written in the United Kingdom and dispensed in the community in England, 2006 to 2015, for BNF Section 4.3 antidepressants.
Year | Prescription Items (000s) |
2006 | 31,038.0 |
2007 | 33,839.6 |
2008 | 35,960.5 |
2009 | 39,140.5 |
2010 | 42,788.0 |
2011 | 46,677.8 |
2012 | 50,167.2 |
2013 | 53,326.6 |
2014 | 57,147.9 |
2015 | 61,021.6 |
Source: Prescription Cost Analysis provided by NHS Digital.