Category: Epidemiology
Objective: To assess characteristics of Medicare prescribers for Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients, as a target population for delivering advanced PD care education.
Background: PD is the second most common neurodegenerative disorder in the US, with challenging clinical features including motor symptoms, non-motor symptoms, and fluctuations with the disease progression. Over the past decade, new pharmacotherapeutic strategies are available for PD patients. Providers should have a substantial understanding of the different treatment options, benefits, and side effects to optimize the quality of PD care.
Method: This is a cross-sectional study of Medicare Part D Public Use Files claims data in 2017. We evaluated prescribing patterns of carbidopa-levodopa between all Medicare providers is all states and the District of Columbia. Provider characteristics, including self-reported specialty and practice location, were assessed. SPSS 25 was used for descriptive statistical analysis.
Results: A total of 46176 providers prescribed generic carbidopa-levodopa immediate release (IR), 12672 prescribed carbidopa-levodopa ER, 3189 prescribed carbidopa-levodopa-entacapone, and 2073 providers prescribed Rytary. Among Carbidopa-levodopa IR prescribers, the majority (31.4%) were internal medicine physicians, 29.5% were Family physicians, only 17.7% were neurologists. Other forms of carbidopa-levodopa were mainly prescribed by neurologists. States with the highest number of prescribers included California (4358), New York (3270), Florida (2893), Pennsylvania (2557), and Texas (2475).
Conclusion: Primary care specialties, including internal medicine, family medicine, and nurse practitioners, comprise the majority of prescribers for PD patients in the US. Advanced neurotherapeutic education and decision support guidelines for these providers may help to improve PD care in the US.
To cite this abstract in AMA style:
S. Miri, D. Enayati, Y. Torres-Yaghi, A. Carwin, S. Nakano, M.W Anjum, F.S Amjad, F. Pagan. Characteristics of prescribers for Parkinson’s disease patients: A nationwide study on 2017 Medicare data [abstract]. Mov Disord. 2020; 35 (suppl 1). https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/characteristics-of-prescribers-for-parkinsons-disease-patients-a-nationwide-study-on-2017-medicare-data/. Accessed June 15, 2025.« Back to MDS Virtual Congress 2020
MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/characteristics-of-prescribers-for-parkinsons-disease-patients-a-nationwide-study-on-2017-medicare-data/