Impact of COVID-19 pandemic policies on ADHD medication prescriptions among children and adolescents in Portugal.

UNLABELLED: This study aims to analyse the prescription of medication for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children and adolescents, by age group and gender, before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the impact of government policies during this period. This study was a retrospective cohort analysis using data from the Portuguese national prescription database and included all children and adolescents aged 5-19 years. We conducted an interrupted time series analysis, modelled using a seasonal autoregressive integrated moving average (SARIMA) approach, to evaluate the impact on prescription medications while considering two intervention points resulting from government policies: March 2020, marking the start of strict anti-pandemic measures, and May 2021, marking the beginning of their easing. Following the start of strict anti-pandemic measures, from March 2020 to May 2021, a 9% lower prescription rate than expected was observed, while from June 2021 to December 2023, the prescription rate was greater than expected (+ 32%, with a peak of + 41% in children 5-9 years old) and more pronounced in girls.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings highlight the complex impact of the pandemic on different age groups and between genders on the prescription of ADHD medicines.

WHAT IS KNOWN: • ADHD medications are considered effective and have been increasingly prescribed to children and adolescents in recent years.

WHAT IS NEW: • Following the COVID-19 pandemic, the increase in ADHD medication prescriptions exceeded expected trends. • Stratification by age group and gender revealed gender differences, with a more pronounced rise in prescriptions observed among girls.