Florido Alba, FranciscoGarcía-Agua, NuriaMartín Reyes, ÁngelClavero Barranquero, AntonioGarcía Ruiz, Antonio J.2022-11-222022-11-222021-06-18Florido Alba F, García-Agua N, Martín Reyes A, Clavero Barranquero A, García Ruiz AJ. Impact of Covid-19 containment on community pharmaceutical spending in Andalusia - Spain. Pharmacy Practice 2021 Apr-Jun;19(2):23461885-642Xhttp://hdl.handle.net/10668/4390Background: In the field of health, the year 2020 will be remembered for testing (stressing) all health institutions and their forms of management (centralised and decentralised). The everyday activity of primary and hospital care was significantly altered by the introduction of telephone consultations, which reduce the number of visits to health centres or hospitals and are still relevant today in the face of successive waves of the pandemic.Objective: To analyse whether population confinement due to the COVID-19 pandemic had an impact on the dispensing of medications in community pharmacies and the associated spending during the period March-July 2020 in Andalusia (Spain).Methods: A time series analysis applying econometric model analysis techniques to confirm or rule out whether the lockdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic had an impact on the dispensing of medications by community pharmacies and the associated expenditures. The variables used were the number of medication containers dispensed by community pharmacies (charged to the public funds of the Spanish National Health System) and the expenditure on prescription drugs, both in relation to the population. The analysis was performed within the region of Andalusia, which has 8,464,441 inhabitants.Results: The data obtained from the time series confirmed that there were no significant differences during the studied period between the number of medication containers actually dispensed and the number that would have been expected to be dispensed according to the trend in this variable for the sample period. The expenditure results followed the same pattern.Conclusions: The health crisis produced by the COVID-19 lockdown had no impact on medication consumption in Andalusia.enAttribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 Internacionalhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/COVID-19PandemicsPrescription drugsHealth expendituresFinancial managementNational health programsPharmaciesGovernment programsModels, econometricInterrupted time series analysisSpainPandemiasMedicamentos bajo prescripciónGastos en saludGestión financieraProgramas nacionales de saludFarmaciaProgramas gubernamentalesModelos econométricosAnálisis de series de tiempo interrumpidoEspañaMedical Subject Headings::Organisms::Eukaryota::Animals::Chordata::Vertebrates::Mammals::Primates::Haplorhini::Catarrhini::Hominidae::HumansMedical Subject Headings::Health Care::Health Care Facilities, Manpower, and Services::Health Facilities::PharmaciesMedical Subject Headings::Chemicals and Drugs::Pharmaceutical Preparations::Prescription DrugsMedical Subject Headings::Health Care::Health Care Economics and Organizations::Economics::Costs and Cost Analysis::Health ExpendituresMedical Subject Headings::Health Care::Environment and Public Health::Public Health::Disease Outbreaks::Epidemics::PandemicsMedical Subject Headings::Geographical Locations::Geographic Locations::Europe::SpainMedical Subject Headings::Analytical, Diagnostic and Therapeutic Techniques and Equipment::Investigative Techniques::Models, Theoretical::Models, Statistical::Models, EconomicMedical Subject Headings::Health Care::Health Services Administration::Organization and Administration::Professional Practice::Referral and ConsultationMedical Subject Headings::Phenomena and Processes::Physical Phenomena::Time::Time FactorsMedical Subject Headings::Information Science::Information Science::Communications Media::Telecommunications::TelephoneMedical Subject Headings::Anthropology, Education, Sociology and Social Phenomena::Social Sciences::Government ProgramsMedical Subject Headings::Health Care::Health Care Economics and Organizations::Economics::Financial ManagementMedical Subject Headings::Health Care::Health Care Economics and Organizations::Health Planning::National Health Programsresearch article34221202Acceso abierto10.18549/PharmPract.2021.2.23461886-3655PMC8234708