Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by semi-extrinsic 3320 days ago
How many people with some sort of inflammation are on anti-TNF-alpha aka. Humira (for arthritis, psoriasis, intestinal inflammation diseases, etc.) in the UK? It's a treatment covered by the NHS. While "only" £10,000 per patient per year, so an order of magnitude cheaper than what is discussed here, it's typically prescribed for orders of magnitude longer (as in several decades).
1 comments
DanBC 3320 days ago
English prescribing is open data. The answer might be here: https://openprescribing.net/

Is Humira the same as adalimumab?

https://openprescribing.net/chemical/1001030S0/

https://openprescribing.net/analyse/#org=CCG&numIds=1001030S...

link
semi-extrinsic 3320 days ago
Yup, adalimumab is another name (naming of biologicals is weird). That data suggests about 500 people in the UK are on Humira; a bit lower than I expected, but I gather they only prescribe it as a drug of last resort.

However, if you click to get map data in the second link you give it's really weird. There's basically no subscription in most of England, but very high in a few small pockets, and not in any sensible pattern (e.g. if you scroll back a couple of months there's none in all of London, and these items are prescribed in a very regular way). Maybe this search somehow doesn't get all the data?

link