Abstract
Introduction: Benzodiazepines belong to the group of anxiolytic sedatives and the most prescribed drugs in the world. The authors conducted this pilot study based n large number of patients reports that they were less anxious and felt better overall by migrating to sunnier environments. Aim: We estimated the impact of the total sunshine hours per month on daily exposure of the population to Benzodiazepine anxiolytic on a monthly basis in the Republic of Serbia. Material and Methods: We conducted a retrospective academic IV phase study, which tested the correlation of time series of monthly sold Benzodiazepine anxiolytics in pharmacies and total sunshine hours per month in the Republic of Serbia, from January 2014 to May 2019. Results: According to the seasons, we did not find any difference in the increase of the population exposure to benzodiazepines. A difference was found between bromazepam consumption compared to cumulative monthly. Bromazepam consumption was negatively correlated with the cumulative monthly sunshine hours. The cutoff value for bromazepam was 131.45 cumulative monthly sunshine hours. Conclusion: This is the first pharmaco-epidemiologic study to prove that the population's exposure to benzodiazepines, in addition to the implicit health and economic effects on physicians' prescribing habits for these drugs, can be independently linked to the cumulative effects of monthly sunshine hours on the population. No difference in Benzodiazepine consumption was found in relation to the seasons (spring/summer vs autumn/winter). In months where sunshine hours was ≥135.45, the need for bromazepam was significantly reduced. Seasonal variation of climatic effects of total monthly sunshine hours is significantly correlated with the population's need for benzodiazepines with anxiolytic effects longer than 12 hours.
Highlights
Benzodiazepines belong to the group of anxiolytic sedatives and the most prescribed drugs in the world [1]
Working towards of our research goal, we first divided the months according to the seasons when it is natural to expect less sunshine autumn/winter vs spring/summer and we examined the significance of the difference in benzodiazepine exposure between these periods
We did not find any difference in the increase in exposure of the population for benzodiazepines) (Table 1, 2)
Summary
Benzodiazepines belong to the group of anxiolytic sedatives and the most prescribed drugs in the world [1]. Papers that can be found in the scientific literature describe the effects in relation to pharmacokinetic parameters, product quality, price, economic parameters of development and stability of the place of residence, personal life circumstances and psychiatric history of people [3, 4, 5, 6]. The authors conducted this pilot study based on reports from a growing number of patients that they have become less anxious and feel better overall by migrating to sunnier environments
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