Does Pregabalin (Lyrica®) Help Patients Reduce their Use of Benzodiazepines? A Comparison with Gabapentin using the Norwegian Prescription Database

Pregabalin (Lyrica (R)) may have an anxiolytic effect. It has also been reported that the use of this drug helps prevent excessive use of benzodiazepines. The aim of the present study was to examine if pregabalin reduced the intake of benzodiazepines. In a pharmacoepidemiological study, we compared pregabalin to the older drug gabapentin (Neurontin (R)) in the Norwegian Prescription Database. The database has total capture of all prescribed drugs outside institutions. We identified all prescriptions for the two drugs for patients aged 18-69 years between 2004 and 2007. Patients were grouped as psychiatric patients, patients with epilepsy, patients with neuropathic pain or non-specified users. We measured the use of benzodiazepines 182 days before and after the initiation of treatment with pregabalin and gabapentin. Between 15% and 29% of the patients were able to stop using benzodiazepines after starting pregabalin or gabapentin treatment. Psychiatric patients who started pregabalin were able to reduce the amount of benzodiazepines used by 48%, compared to only 14% among starters of gabapentin. This study shows that some patients reduced their use of benzodiazepines substantially after starting pregabalin.