Letter

Sex difference in prescription of asthma drugs is smaller than previously found

BMJ 1999; 319 doi: 10.1136/bmj.319.7206.385 (Published 7 August 1999)
Cite this as: BMJ 1999;319:385.1

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  1. B D Pethica, research fellow (WARG.Sec@wnmeds.ac.nz),
  2. A Tomlin, junior research fellow,
  3. J Hall, junior research fellow,
  4. A Penrose, junior research fellow,
  5. G Frost, medical director
  1. Wellington Asthma Research Group, Wellington School of Medicine, Wellington South, New Zealand
  2. Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners Research Unit, Department of General Practice, Dunedin School of Medicine, University of Otago, Dunedin, NZ
  3. 3M Pharmaceuticals, Auckland, New Zealand

    EDITOR—We were surprised to see the relation between people's sex and, in those with asthma, their likelihood of being prescribed oral steroids, as found by Sexton et al.1 We analysed a larger dataset, as they suggest. We included computerised 1996 RNZCGP data from a consulting population of 201 954 patients (90 214 men and 109 079 women; 2661 sex not recorded). The nature and reliability of the RNZCGP database are well established.2 3 The target patients were in the age band 20-54 years (42 264 men and 55 670 women). Patients were …

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