The application of population based health surveys in pharmacoepidemiologic studies in Norway

摘要

There has been a modest interest in pharmacoepidemiologic research in Norway, especially when consideringthat drugs are comprising the most common medical treatment and the health care segment with themost rapidly increasing costs in health care. There may be several explanation for the relatively lowresearch output. One may be the generally poor access to information from issued drug prescriptions.Comprehensive population based health surveys have been carried out in Norway for many years. Thehealth surveys have also been used as a basis for studies of drug use, and they have made it possible tocollect important background information associated with drug use. However, health surveys have primarilyhad their origin in etiological research and the charting of major diseases in the population. Informationon drug use has primarily been included as indicators of morbidity. The questions about drug use havetherefore been general and covered the use of most drug groups. They have usually included both prescriptionand non-prescription drugs.The more recent health surveys include questions on drugs with a more focused approach. More questionsare now directed towards more defined health problems and drugs.Access to individual based drug information from issued prescriptions, with the possibility of doing recordlinkage studies combining data from the health surveys and prescription information, may contributesignificantly to the quality of pharmacoepidemiologic research in Norway.