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Data from the NHS Business Services Authority has revealed 16.5 million items for dependency-forming medicines were prescribed to 4.37 million patients in England at a cost of £83.7 million during the first quarter of this financial year.

The cost of the medicines was a 57 per cent drop compared with the period covering April to June 2015-16 and was driven “primarily by an 84 per cent decline in the total cost of gabapentinoid prescribing since quarter one in 2015-16,” according to NHSBSA.

That, it said, was largely down to pregabalin coming off patent in August 2017, allowing cheaper generic alternatives to be prescribed. Opioid drug costs also fell by 39 per cent over the same 10-year period.

The data showed opioid drugs accounted for the largest proportion of dependency-forming medicine prescriptions between April and June this year, with 9.67 million items prescribed at a cost of £64.5 million.

The biggest group prescribed opioids were females aged 60 to 64, with 291,000 patients receiving the drugs. Seventy-eight per cent more patients received opioids in the most deprived parts of the country compared with the least deprived areas.

The data includes prescriptions in the community but not medicines prescribed and dispensed in secondary care, prisons or provided by private prescribers. The data does not include medicines used to treat existing drug dependence or substance misuse disorders.