Does the early adopter of drugs exist? A population-based study of general practitioners? prescribing of new drugs
Abstract
Objective To analyse associations between indicators for adoption of new drugs and to test the hypothesis that physicians' early adoption of new drugs is a personal trait independent of drug groups.Methods In a population-based cohort study using register data, we analysed the prescribing of new drugs by Danish general practitioners. Angiotensin-II antagonists, triptans, selective cyclo-oxygenase-2 antagonists and esomeprazol were used in the assessment. As indicators of new drug uptake, we used adoption time, cumulative incidence, preference proportion, incidence rate and prescription cost and volume. For each measure, we ranked the general practices. Ranks were pair-wise plotted, and Pearson's correlation coefficient ( r) was calculated. Next, we analysed the correlation between ranks across different drug classes.Results For all indicators, the general practitioners' adoption of one group of drugs was poorly associated with adoption of others ( r</=0.49), indicating that early adoption of one type of drugs is not associated with early adoption of another. For all drug groups, adoption time adjusted for practice size was only weakly associated with other indicators ( r: -0.56 to -0.27). Indicators, based on cost and volume of drugs, were highly correlated ( r: 0.96-0.99), and the others correlated reasonably well ( r: 0.51-0.91).Conclusions Within drug groups, indicators of drug adoption, except for adoption time, correlate reasonably well. However, the theory that physicians' early adoption of new drugs is a personal trait independent of the type of drug could not be confirmed. The notion of the early-drug-adopting general practitioner may be mistaken.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Previous studies have found that physicians may be early adopters of other ideas and products, such as pharmaceuticals.
“Previous studies have found that physicians may be early adopters of other ideas and products, such as pharmaceuticals [34].”
From Social media use by physicians: a qualitative study of the new frontier of medicine (2016) · cites this paper as [34]
Cites
Rogers, E. M., Singhal, A., & Quinlan, M. M. (2019) · Routledge eBooks · doi:10.4324/9780203710753-35 · Cited by 37,557 · see citing works
Gluesing, J. C. (2012) · Sage eBooks · doi:10.4135/9781412994231.n14 · Cited by 3,259 · see citing works
Medical Innovation: A Diffusion Study.
Mechanic, D., Coleman, J. S., Katz, E., & Menzel, H. (1967) · American Sociological Review · doi:10.2307/2091036 · Cited by 1,383 · see citing works
Medical Innovation: A Diffusion Study.
Sower, C., Coleman, J. S., Katz, E., & Menzel, H. (1967) · Administrative Science Quarterly · doi:10.2307/2391560 · Cited by 579 · see citing works
The Danish prescription registries.
Gaist, D., Sørensen, H. T., & Hallas, J. (1997) · PubMed · Cited by 570 · see citing works
Getting Evidence into Practice
Sanderson, I. (2004) · Evaluation · doi:10.1177/1356389004048283 · Cited by 313 · see citing works
Making better use of research findings
Haines, A., & Donald, A. (1998) · BMJ · doi:10.1136/bmj.317.7150.72 · Cited by 253 · see citing works
Moulding, N., Silagy, C., & Weller, D. (1999) · BMJ Quality & Safety · doi:10.1136/qshc.8.3.177 · Cited by 252 · see citing works
EUR-ASSESS Project Subgroup Report on Dissemination and Impact
Granados, A., Jonsson, E., Banta, H. D., Bero, L. A., Bonair, A., Cochet, M. C., Freemantle, N., Grilli, R. G., Grimshaw, J., Harvey, E., et al. (1997) · International Journal of Technology Assessment in Health Care · doi:10.1017/s0266462300010370 · Cited by 127 · see citing works
Getting evidence into practice
Godlee, F. (1998) · BMJ · doi:10.1136/bmj.317.7150.6 · Cited by 68 · see citing works
Diffusion of new drugs in Danish general practice
Steffensen, F. H. (1999) · Family Practice · doi:10.1093/fampra/16.4.407 · Cited by 64 · see citing works
Søndergaard, J., Andersen, M., Vach, K., Kragstrup, J., Maclure, M., & Gram, L. F. (2002) · European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology · doi:10.1007/s00228-002-0454-5 · Cited by 44 · cited 1× · see citing works
“Previous studies, however, indicate that non-redemption rates are relatively low on Funen [18].”
ResultChanging medication use in managed care: a critical review of the available evidence.
Pearson, S., Ross‐Degnan, D., Payson, A., & Soumerai, S. B. (2003) · PubMed · Cited by 34 · see citing works
Gs, D. (2000) · PubMed · Cited by 30 · see citing works
Why physicians start or stop prescribing a drug: Literature review and formulary implications
Groves, K. E. M., Flanagan, P. S., & MacKinnon, N. J. (2002) · Cited by 17 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Social media use by physicians: a qualitative study of the new frontier of medicine
Campbell, L., Evans, Y., Pumper, M., & Moreno, M. A. (2016) · BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making · doi:10.1186/s12911-016-0327-y · Cited by 135 · see citing works
- Authors
- Dybdahl, T., Andersen, M., S�ndergaard, J., Kragstrup, J., & Kristiansen, I. S.
- Affiliations
- University of Southern Denmark (DK)
- Corresponding author
- Dybdahl, Torben
- Venue
- European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology
- Published
- 2004-10-21
- Volume
- 60
- Issue
- 9
- Pages
- 667-672
- ISSN
- 0031-6970 (ISSN-L)
- 1432-1041
- OpenAlex
- W1995259694
- Cited by
- 31
- References
- 15
- Citations by year
- 2025: 1 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 1 · 2021: 1 · 2019: 1 · 2016: 2 · 2014: 1 · 2012: 1
- FWCI
- 6.35
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- Locations
- European Journal of Clinical Pharmacology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- University of Southern Denmark Research Portal (University of Southern Denmark) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Pharmaceutical Economics and Policy
- Life Sciences › Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutics › Pharmacology › Pharmaceutical industry and healthcare
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Healthcare Policy and Management
- Keywords
- early adopters, general practitioners, prescribing patterns, angiotensin receptor blockers, triptans, esomeprazole
- MeSH terms
- Decision Making, Denmark, Drug Therapy, Drug Utilization, Family Practice, Humans, Practice Patterns, Physicians', Physicians, Family, Time Factors, Cohort Studies, Databases, Factual
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
