Drug utilization studies and epidemiology.

Drug utilization studies have developed rapidly over the last ten years to become not only a new tool of investigation for clinical pharmacology but also a source of suggestive information for epidemiology. This paper begins by reviewing the general terms of reference, with special emphasis on the WHO-recommended methodology based on defined daily doses (D.D.D.), then focuses on antidiabetic treatment, and antihypertensive therapy, and on the use of drugs in psychiatry, in pregnancy, in elderly people and in cancer patients. These examples are given to show how drug utilization studies can be of use for epidemiological studies.