Trends, geographic variation, and factors associated with prescribing of gluten-free foods in English primary care: a cross sectional study
Alex J Walker, Helen J Curtis, Seb Bacon, Richard Croker, Ben Goldacre
Background: There is substantial disagreement about whether gluten-free foods should be prescribed on the NHS. We aim to describe time trends, variation and factors associated with prescribing gluten-free foods in England. Methods: We described long-term national trends in gluten-free prescribing, and practice and Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) level monthly variation in the rate of gluten-free prescribing (per 1000 patients) over time. We used a mixed effect poisson regression model to determine factors associated with gluten-free prescribing rate. Results: There were 1.3 million gluten-free prescriptions between July 2016 and June 2017, down from 1.8 million in 2012/13, with a corresponding cost reduction from £25.4m to £18.7m. There was substantial variation in prescribing rates among practices (range 0 to 148 prescriptions per 1000 patients, interquartile range 7.3 to 31.8), driven in part by substantial variation at the CCG level, likely due to differences in prescribing policy. Practices in the most deprived quintile of deprivation score had a lower prescribing rate than those in the highest quintile (incidence rate ratio 0.89, 95% confidence interval 0.87-0.91). This is potentially a reflection of the lower rate of diagnosed coeliac disease in more deprived populations. Conclusion: Gluten-free prescribing is in a state of flux, with substantial clinically unwarranted variation between practices and CCGs.