Quality of Life Assessment in Patients Using Benzodiazepines during the COVID-19 Pandemic in a Community Pharmacy Using EuroQol 5D-3L

• Main Authors: Daida Alberto Armas (Author), Juan Ramón Santana Ayala (Author), Yanira Román Castillo (Author), Arturo Hardisson de la Torre (Author), Carmen Rubio Armendáriz (Author)
• Format: Book
• Published: MDPI AG, 2023-01-01T00:00:00Z.
• Subjects: article
• Online Access: Connect to this object online.
• Notes: 10.3390/pharmacy11010019; 2226-4787
• Keywords: benzodiazepines; pharmaceutical care; health quality; Pharmacy and materia medica; RS1-441
• Source: Pharmacy, Vol 11, Iss 1, p 19 (2023)

Users of benzodiazepines (BZDs) should have their quality of life monitored to minimize the risks associated with long-term treatments. The aim of this study is to use the EuroQol 5D-3L to analyze the quality of life of 127 patients under treatment with BZDs during the COVID-19 pandemic. The results show that lorazepam comprises 25.49% of all dispensing requests, and that the mean duration of BZDs treatments is four years (range: 0.3-25). When rating their general health status, BZDs users reported 59.29 points out of 100. Thirty-two percent of patients reported mobility problems; 16.5% reported having a lot of pain or discomfort despite being treated with BZDs, and 16.54% used a BZD together with an opioid analgesic. The EuroQol 5D-3L dimension "anxiety/depression" showed that, despite the use of BZDs, 48.2% of the patients reported being moderately anxious or depressed and 13.4% described themselves as very anxious or depressed. Nevertheless, 37.8% of BZDs users were identified as potential candidates to follow a BZD deprescription plan. In conclusion, BZDs users showed a low quality of life during the COVID-19 pandemic. Older patients and females have been identified as groups of patients that could benefit from integrating the use of the EuroQol 5D-3L instrument into the protocols of the pharmaceutical care follow up.