Drug utilization research in a primary mental health service in Northeast of Brazil

the psychosocial care center (caps) is a community-based mental health service in brazil, which aims to promote the psychosocial rehabilitation of patients. accordingly, this study describes the drug use evaluation in a primary mental health service in northeast of brazil. setting: caps ‘valter correia’, s？o cristov？o, sergipe, brazil. methods: a cross-sectional study was conducted between august 2009 and may 2010. initially, medical records were reviewed and evaluated. then, we applied interviews with the patients (and/or their informal/family caregivers) attended at the caps. informations were obtained regarding to demographic and clinical features, diagnoses and drugs prescribed. all patients registered in the caps were included in the study. the results were statistically analyzed using the epiinfo and were compared with results from literature. results: the caps ‘valter correia’ consists of 101 registered patients, the majority were male (58.4%), illiterate (51.5%), without monthly income (49.5%) and the average age of them 42.2 years (sd = 12.0). schizophrenia was the most frequent mental disorder (31.5%). the average number of medications by patients was 3.11 (sd = 1.41), and the older group of patients (75-80 years) presented the largest consumption of medications (5.50 drugs/patient). the psychiatric drug class most frequently prescribed was antipsychotics (44.8%). angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors were the most prevalent non-psychiatric therapeutic class (15.8%). it was detected 133 drug-drug interactions (3.0% mild, 54.1% moderate, 29.3% severe and 13.5% contraindicated). conclusion: the results revealed the need for monitoring the pharmacotherapy of patients with mental disorders to encourage the rational use of medications.