More Than Half of New Stimulant Prescriptions at Pandemic ’s Height Delivered Via Telemedicine

More than half of all first prescriptions for stimulant medications during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic were initiated via telemedicine, astudy inPsychiatric Services has found. The study also suggests that telemedicine was more commonly used by psychiatrists than other health care providers and was associated with greater odds of receiving follow-up care.Haiden A. Huskamp, Ph.D., of Harvard Medical School and colleagues analyzed data on commercially insured individuals recorded in the Optum Labs Data Warehouse from January 2019 through April 2022. The study used data from 535,629 children aged 2 to 17 years and 2,116,160 adults aged 18 to 64 years.The percentage of adults who received their first prescription for stimulants (stimulant initiation) via telemedicine peaked at 52.7% in April 2020, then dropped to 27.9% by April 2022. The percentage of children who received their stimulant initiation via telemedicine peaked at 56.8% in April 2020, then dropped to 13.9% by April 2022.Psychiatrists used telemedicine for 55.3% of their stimulant initiations for adults, whereas nonpsychiatrists used telemedicine for only 26.6% of their stimulant initiations for adults. Psychiatrists used telemedicine for 48.6% of their stimulant initiations for children, whereas nonpsychiatrists used telemedicine for only 17.5% of their stimulant initiations for children.“Telemedicine initiation offered a way for adults and children to access ADHD [attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder] t...
Source: Psychiatr News - Category: Psychiatry Tags: ADHD adults children COVID-19 new prescriptions pandemic Psychiatric Services stimulants Source Type: research