OBJECTIVES: Electronic prescription is mandatory in Finland since 1 January, 2017. A physician or a dentist can issue a written (paper) or a telephone prescription under exceptional circumstances set by law, and the reason for issuing must be given. Because of the administrative nationwide change it was the first time possible to measure prescription volume in Finland.

METHODS: Written and telephone prescriptions were typed in to the national Prescription Centre at the 815 pharmacies. Electronic prescriptions were sent to the Prescription Centre from electronic patient data systems, or Kelain web prescription service. Data from the Prescription Centre were extracted from 1 January till 31 May, 2017.

RESULTS: There were 13,874,515 (100%) new electronic prescriptions, of which 97.7% were from electronic patient data systems and 1.0% from Kelain web service. Altogether 181,436 (1.3%) prescriptions were typed in at the pharmacies, of which 121,751 (0.9%) were written and 57,340 (0.4%) telephone prescriptions. Approximately half of the prescriptions typed in at the pharmacies were written prescriptions that were issued because of a technical failure.

CONCLUSIONS: In this study we report the first time prescription volume in Finland. All the prescriptions in the national Prescription Centre are electronic, and only 1.3% of the prescriptions were typed in at the pharmacies in the first five months since the electronic prescription became mandatory 1 January, 2017. Written prescriptions were issued because a technical failure occurred in local or areal data or software systems.