ArticleBMC medicine2026
Redeemed prescription medicines to measure quality of life of patients with long-term conditions: a national cross-sectional study.
Article in BMC medicine, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundThe prevalence of multimorbidity is increasing and is associated with polypharmacy (PP) and a reduced quality of life (QoL). Polypharmacy consistently correlates with poorer outcomes; however, its relationship with QoL in a broad general practice population is underexplored. For the general practitioner, QoL assessment is resource-intensive; therefore, this study examines whether the number of redeemed unique prescription medications can serve as an indicator for QoL in patients with multimorbidity managed in general practice.
methodsThis nationwide cross-sectional study was conducted with data from questionnaires sent to 160,584 adults from 250 general practices who consulted their general practitioner for an annual chronic disease consultation in 2022. Questionnaire data were linked with socioeconomic and medication data from Danish Registries. We examined the association between the number of redeemed unique prescription medicines and six domains of QoL with linear models and tested for effect modification with multivariable linear models. The multivariable models were adjusted for the covariates sex, age, education, and cohabitation. The number of unique prescription medications that constitute a minimal clinically important difference (MCID) was calculated. Further, we presented associations between redeemed unique prescription medications and QoL stratified by the covariates.
resultsAll 35,977 patients who participated in the survey were included in this study, with 18,665 (51.9%) being female. A linear association was found between redeemed unique prescription medications and more burdened QoL in all six domains. The largest association (2.95; 95% CI 2.87-3.03) and lowest MCID (4.4 redemptions) were found in the domain of physical ability. Stratified analyses appeared visually parallel with no clinically meaningful effect modification by any covariate in any QoL domain.
conclusionsFindings indicate a potential use of redeemed prescriptions as an indicator for the physical ability domains of QoL in clinical practice. The study found no clinically relevant effect modification.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.