Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS) is a common condition affecting 5-10% of young women. In addition to problems with excess hair growth, menstrual irregularity and subfertility, women with PCOS are at increased risk of several adverse health outcomes, including anxiety and depression, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular events. Collectively, these are likely to lead to an increased use of health resources and cost pressures on the NHS, yet no previous studies have examined this in the UK. In this study we wish to explore the economic burden of PCOS on the U.K. health system in comparison to a group of non-PCOS women. To do this we will select patients from the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) with a recorded diagnosis of PCOS and will match them with patients without PCOS by age, body mass index (BMI) and general practice. We will then compare health resource use in women with PCOS against non-PCOS women, including costs of GP visits, prescriptions, inpatient and outpatient admissions. In addition to this the trend of PCOS will be assessed by looking at how many women are diagnosed with PCOS over the years between 2004 and 2020.
Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS) is the most common endocrine condition affecting young women. We aim to assess the impact of PCOS on health resource utilisation in both primary and secondary care settings. Patients with PCOS will be selected between 01/01/2004 and 31/12/2020. from the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) Aurum dataset based on a primary care diagnosis or secondary care recorded diagnosis. Patients will be matched by age, body mass index and primary care practice to control subjects with no history of PCOS. Outcomes be the prevalence and incidence of PCOS and the number of primary and secondary care contacts and associated costs of managing women with PCOS. Prevalence will be assessed at the midpoint of each year between 2004 and 2020. The numerator will include all females ≥ 16 years old who have been diagnosed with PCOS before the midpoint. Incidence will be assessed over the same time-period. The numerator will consist of all females ≥16 years old who were diagnosed with PCOS in the respective year. Primary care contacts recorded in the CPRD consultation data will be classified by staff type and by consultation type, and then assigned an average cost as listed in the Unit Costs of Health and Social Care 2019. Prescription items recorded in the CPRD therapy data will be assigned a net ingredient cost (NIC) per prescription from the Prescription Cost Analysis (PCA) for England 2019. Inpatient admissions recorded in HES Admitted Patient Care data will be processed into Healthcare Resource Groups (HRGs) using the HRG-grouper. Outpatient consultations recorded in HES Outpatient data will be costed using specialty codes to designate each appointment to an outpatient tariff. These will be compared in regression models between cases and controls using the Poisson distribution for contacts and the Gamma distribution for costs
Prevalence of PCOS, incidence of PCOS; primary care contacts; primary care prescriptions; inpatient admissions; outpatient appointments; primary care costs, primary care prescription costs, inpatient costs, outpatient costs
Christopher Morgan - Chief Investigator - Pharmatelligence Limited t/a Human Data Sciences
Thomas Berni - Corresponding Applicant - Pharmatelligence Limited t/a Human Data Sciences
Aled Rees - Collaborator - Cardiff University
HES Admitted Patient Care;HES Outpatient;ONS Death Registration Data;Patient Level Index of Multiple Deprivation