Effects of a price cut reform on the cost and utilization of antidiabetic drugs in Korea: a national health insurance database study

Table 1 Definition of outcome measures

Outcomes	Measures	Definition
Primary outcomes	Pharmaceutical cost^a (total)	• Monthly cost of antidiabetics
	Pharmaceutical utilization (total)	• Monthly DDDs of antidiabetics
	Pharmaceutical utilization (total)	• Monthly number of patients with at least one antidiabetics
Secondary outcomes	Pharmaceutical cost^a (per patient)	• Monthly cost per patient with antidiabetics
	Pharmaceutical utilization (per patient)	• Monthly DDDs per patient with antidiabetics
	Incidents of medical and surgical procedures relating to diabetic complications	• Diabetic retinopathy including 3 procedures (panretinal photocoagulation, and vitrectomy)
		• Diabetic cataract including 4 procedures (extracapsular or intracapsular extraction, pars plana lensectomy, phacoemulsification, and surgery after cataract)
		• Diabetic nephropathy including 20 procedures (e.g., AV shunt, fistula formation or various intravenous catheter insertions for hemodialysis, kidney transplant)
		• Cardiovascular complications of diabetics including 15 procedures (e.g., percutaneous coronary intervention, coronary artery bypass grafting)
		• Diabetic foot lesions including 31 procedures (e.g., limb amputation, atherectomy)

^aCost in Korean won, KRW (1 US dollar ≒ 1000 KRW); DDD = defined daily dose (In the case of pharmaceutical items without DDD information, for example, combinations of oral blood glucose lowering drugs (A10BD), we divided the total quantity consumed by the standard daily dosage designated for adults in the Korean official labels to compute total DDDs for that item)

ISSN: 1472-6963