Seasonal Variation in Antidepressant Prescribing
Adrian Heald, Mike Stedman, Sanam Farman, Nadia Ruzhdi, Mark Davies, David Taylor
Abstract
OBJECTIVE: The number of prescriptions for antidepressants in England has almost doubled in the past decade. The objective of this study was to examine if this growth and seasonal variation in prescribing rates of different antidepressants by general practice are linked. METHOD: The number of prescriptions and quantity of antidepressants prescribed each month between January 1, 2014, and December 31, 2019 from the general practice prescribing data reports for each British National Formulary code and practice were analyzed. The data were aggregated to obtain the monthly total and analyzed to identify patterns by medication. RESULTS: = .536, P = .002). CONCLUSIONS: The study confirmed seasonal variation in antidepressant prescribing with a peak in November/December. Growth in the antidepressant prescribing year on year was related to seasonality and requires further scrutiny in terms of understanding the factors that underlie the seasonal variation seen.