Nutritional Products
Page last updated: 4 March 2016
Drug utilisation sub-committee (DUSC)
October 2015
Abstract
Purpose
To assess the utilisation of food and nutritional products listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS). This review focuses on products for cows’ milk protein intolerance following the July 2012 changes to the PBS restrictions for these products. The DUSC requested an analysis of these products at its February 2015 meeting.
Date of listing on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS)
There are 150 nutritional products listed on the PBS Schedule in August 2015. Approximately a third of these products have been listed since the previous DUSC analysis which assessed utilisation to April 2011 (that is listed since May 2011).
Data Source / methodology
The report used data from the Department of Human Services (DHS) Supplied Prescriptions Database for the majority of analyses. The DHS Authority Approvals database data was used to identify the restrictions for which patients use protein hydrolysate (PH) and amino acid (AA) formulae. At the time of the report, two years of data were available since the July 2012 changes to the PBS restrictions for nutritional products for cows’ milk protein intolerance.
Key Findings
- There has been a substantial decrease in the utilisation of AA formulae for cows’ milk protein intolerance and allergy following the July 2012 restriction changes. Between 2011 and 2014, the number of patients supplied AA formulae decreased by 31% and has since stabilised. At the same time the number of patients supplied PH formulae increased 24%.
- There is a large group of children supplied AA formulae who are aged 2 years and older. Almost 900 patients aged 2 years and older are supplied AA formulae each quarter. In 2014, this represented over 25% of patients supplied AA formulae. This is in contrast to PH formulae which have fewer than 300 patients aged 2 years and older supplied each quarter, representing less than 13% of PH patients in 2014. In 2014, this represented 30% and 19% of total expenditure for AA and PH formulae respectively.
- Infant formula products are the most widely used nutritional products on the PBS, accounting for almost half of PBS expenditure on nutritional products in 2014.
- The use of nutritional products for metabolic conditions or other conditions requiring strict dietary management is growing. From 2011 to 2014, the number of prescriptions for these products increased 7% while expenditure grew 25%.
