OBJECTIVES : In China, there are various kinds of analgesics used during perioperative period, but there is a lack of effective guidance on clinical rational use. This study is to analyze the use of perioperative analgesics, to find out existing problems and to put forward some suggestions in China.

METHODS : The data was collected from the database of the China Medical Economic Information Network (CMEI) that covers 30 provinces and 4 municipalities, with complete purchase and sale records of a total of 793 hospitals. We extracted the purchased data of analgesic drugs from January 2013 to December 2018. According to the expert consensus on perioperative pain management (2015), analgesics were divided into five categories: opioids (Group 1), Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs, Group 2), non-opioid central analgesics (Group 3), local anaesthetics (Group 4), and other analgesics (Group 5).

RESULTS : During the sample year, the total purchase amount of analgesics in the 793 sample hospitals reached 31.2 billion CNY. Among them, Group 1 was with the highest cost and accounted for the largest proportion (57.10%) of market, which is nearly 17.8 billion CNY. Group 2 was the second, with a total cost of 11.4 billion CNY, accounting for 36.48%. Group 3, 4, and 5 were 0.4, 1, and 0.5 billion CNY respectively. Group 1 and Group 2 totally accounted for 93.58%, while that of other analgesics was less than 7%. According to the data of annual total cost, the market of perioperative analgesics increased year by year. In particular, the growth rate of the Group 1 and Group 2 was significantly higher than that of the other three groups.

CONCLUSIONS : The use of perioperative analgesics in China were highly concentrated in opioids and NSAIDs. It is necessary to establish guidelines for the use of analgesics in the perioperative period to standardize the rational use of analgesics.