Urban-Rural Disparity of Generics Prescription in Taiwan: The Example of Dihydropyridine Derivatives

Table 2

Aggregate prescribing amount of DHP derivatives in one million beneficiaries within Taiwan’s National Health Insurance in 2010, stratified by accreditation status and urbanization level.

	Accreditation status of medical facilities
	Academic medical centers	Metropolitan hospitals	Local community hospitals	Physician clinics	Home care units	Total
Number of clinics
Urban	20	54	182	2,921	5	3,182
Suburban	1	27	131	1,945	1	2,105
Rural		2	28	704		734
Total	21	83	341	5,570	6	6,021
Amount of prescribed DHP in DDD
Urban	4,857,576	3,739,490	1,571,777	4,387,141	200	14,555,983
Suburban	3,359	1,404,477	1,055,655	3,102,206	60	5,565,696
Rural		72,611	192,764	1,219,859		1,485,235
Total	4,860,934	5,216,578	2,820,195	8,709,207	260	21,606,914
Amount of prescribed generic DHP in DDD
Urban	324,538	646,557	428,388	2,675,767	60	4,075,110
Suburban	0	148,519	330,358	2,164,702	0	2,643,518
Rural		3,825	70,550	912,724		987,098
Total	324,538	798,900	829,296	5,753,193	60	7,705,727
Generic prescribing ratio of DHP
Urban	6.7%	17.3%	27.3%	61.0%	30.0%	28.0%
Suburban	0.0%	10.6%	31.3%	69.8%	0.0%	47.5%
Rural		5.3%	36.6%	74.8%		66.5%
Total	6.7%	15.3%	29.4%	66.1%	23.1%	35.7%

DDD: defined daily dose; DHP: dihydropyridine.