(C-098) Trends in the consumption of psychotropic drugs in France, in children, adolescents and young adults between 2012 and 2023

Background: By 2022, psychiatric illnesses and psychotropic treatments would be the second largest item of expenditure for the French health insurance system. Few data are available on the use of psychotropic treatments by children, adolescents and young adults, specifically during Covid-19 pandemic.

Objectives: To describe trends in the prevalence of psychotropic drugs use between 2012 and 2024.

Methods: We used data from the French National Health Data System (SNDS), covering 99% of the population, to conduct a repeated cross-sectional utilization study. We measured, each year between 01/01/2012 and 31/12/2024, the number of users under the age of 45 who received at least one box of medication, to analyse annual changes in prevalence rates for six therapeutic classes (anxiolytics, hypnotics, antidepressants, antipsychotics, thymoregulators, psychostimulants) and nine age groups (0-5, 6-11, 12-15, 16-18, 19-24, 25-29, 30-34, 35-39, 40-44).

Results: The overall prevalence of psychotropic drug use was fairly stable at around 10% throughout the study period (12% for women; 8% for men). Prevalence of psychotropic drug consumption increase with age categories (around 1% in 0-5; < 4% in 6-15; 6% in 16-18; 10% in 19-24; 13% in 25-29 rising to 20% in 40-44 year olds).
Between 2012 and 2024, overall prevalence rates decreased slightly for anxiolytics (7.6% to 7.0%) and hypnotics (2.6% to 1.8%), but increased slightly for antidepressants (3.9% to 4.4%) and psychostimulants (0.1% to 0.6%) and were fairly stable for antipsychotics (1.2% to 1.5%) and thymoregulators (0.3% to 0.2%). However, these trends differ according to age groups.
Overall prevalence of use of anxiolytics and antidepressants was higher among women compared to male (9-10% vs. 5-6% and 5-6% vs. 3% respectively). The prevalence of use was higher among males than females for antipsychotics (2% vs. 1%) and for psychostimulants among under-19s.

Between 2020 (start of the COVID-19 pandemic in France) and 2024, the prevalence of use has risen sharply for hypnotics among under-19s (0-5: 0.1% to 0.4%; 6-11: 0.2% to 1%; 12-15: 0.2% to 1%; 16-18: 0.5% to 1%), antidepressants particularly among women aged 12 to 34 (12-15: 0.6% to 1.1%; 16-18: 2.2% to 3.5%; 19-24: 4.3% to 6.6%; 25-29: 5.7% to 8.2%; 30-34: 6.9% to 8.9%), antipsychotics particularly among women aged 16 to 29 (16-18: 0.9% to 1.5%; 19-24: 1.1% to 1.8%; 25-29: 1.3% to 1.8%), and on a transitional basis between 2020 and 2021 for anxiolytics, particularly among women aged 12-29 (12-15: 1.8% to 2.3%; 16-18: 5.2% to 6.2%; 19-24: 9.4% to 10.4%; 25-29: 11.9% to 12.4%).

Conclusions: Regular monitoring of the use of psychotropic drugs in children, adolescents and young adults is essential, particularly to observe the longer effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.