Use of prescription analgesic drugs before and after hip or knee replacement in patients with osteoarthritis

Table 3 The proportions of hip and knee replacement patients who continued to redeem analgesics^a or were new to redeem analgesics^b postoperatively

	Preoperative	Proportion of patients who redeemed analgesics postoperatively
	0–3 months preop	0–3 months postop	3–6 months postop	9–12 months postop	21–24 months postop
Any analgesic drug
Preoperative use^a	6058	5141 (84.9%)	2933 (48.4%)	2591 (42.8%)	2424 (40.0%)
No preoperative use^b	7681	5205 (67.8%)	1331 (17.3%)	1187 (15.5%)	1258 (16.4%)
		p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001
Acetaminophen
Preoperative use^a	1764	1162 (65.9%)	669 (37.9%)	569 (32.3%)	507 (28.7%)
No preoperative use^b	11,975	3796 (31.7%)	881 (7.4%)	812 (6.8%)	896 (7.5%)
		p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001
NSAID
Preoperative use^a	4078	2947 (72.3%)	1440 (35.3%)	1211 (29.7%)	1032 (25.3%)
No preoperative use^b	9661	5181 (53.6%)	1102 (11.4%)	912 (9.4%)	885 (9.2%)
		p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001
Mild opioid
Preoperative use^a	1510	903 (59.8%)	476 (31.5%)	414 (27.4%)	384 (25.4%)
No preoperative use^b	12,229	3159 (25.8%)	549 (4.5%)	452 (3.7%)	521 (4.3%)
		p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001
Strong opioid
Preoperative use^a	58	34 (58.6%)	24 (41.4%)	24 (41.4%)	16 (27.6%)
No preoperative use^b	13,681	251 (1.8%)	30 (0.2%)	39 (0.3%)	30 (0.2%)
		p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001
Medication used for neuropathic pain
Preoperative use^a	454	278 (61.2%)	275 (60.6%)	283 (62.3%)	246 (54.2%)
No preoperative use^b	13,285	165 (1.2%)	168 (1.3%)	197 (1.5%)	252 (1.9%)
		p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001	p < 0.001

^aThe number of patients who had redeemed drugs 3 months preoperatively. The following numbers represent how many of them continued to redeem drugs in different time periods postoperatively (i.e. old users)
^bThe number of patients who had not redeemed drugs 3 months preoperatively. The following numbers represent how many of them redeemed drugs in different time periods postoperatively (i.e. new users)

ISSN: 1471-2474