The 2018 Japan Floods Increased the Frequency of Yokukansan Prescriptions Among Elderly: A Retrospective Cohort Study.

OBJECTIVE: The impact of the 2018 Japan Floods on prescriptions of Yokukansan was evaluated. METHODS: This was a retrospective cohort study based on the National Database of Health Insurance Claims which covers all the prescriptions issued in Japan. Participants were patients aged 65 or older who received any medical care at medical institutions located in the three most-severely affected prefectures between 1 year before and after the disaster. We analyzed the number of new prescriptions of Yokukansan and other Kampo drugs among those who had not been prescribed any Kampo for 1 year before the disaster. Kaplan-Meier analysis and a Cox proportional hazards model were used to evaluate the risk of the disaster for a new prescription. RESULTS: Subjects comprised 1,372,417 people (including 12,787 victims, 0.93%). The hazard ratio (HR) of the disaster for Yokukansan prescriptions was 1.49 [95% confidence intervals (CI): 1.25-1.78], and 1.54 (95% CI: 1.29-1.84) in the crude and age-sex adjusted model, respectively. The HR of the disaster for prescription of other Kampo drugs in the crude and adjusted model was 1.33 (95% CI: 1.27-1.39), and 1.32 (95% CI: 1.27-1.38), respectively. The magnitude of increase of victims prescribed Yokukansan (31.4%) was statistically higher than for those prescribed other Kampo drugs (19.3%) (p < 0.001). CONCLUSION: The disaster increased prescriptions of both Yokukansan and other Kampo drugs among elderly victims. The increase was more remarkable in Yokukansan than other Kampo drugs. Clinicians and policymakers should be aware of the increased need for Yokukansan in times of natural disaster.

Retention of physicians in rural Japan: concerted efforts of the government, prefectures, municipalities and medical schools.

CONTEXT: In post-war Japan, a number of factors lead to a general shortage of physicians by the 1950s, which became acute in rural areas and has continued until recent times. ISSUE: Teamwork among national, prefectural, municipal governments and public medical schools has addressed this shortage of physicians. The national government doubled the number of medical schools in the 1960s and 1970s; each of the country's 47 prefectures, whether rural or not, has at least one medical school. In rural areas where private hospitals are not profitable, municipal governments have funded public hospitals and physician recruitment from their own budgets. A cooperative project among Japan's 47 prefectural governments and the national government established Jichi Medical University (JMU), which conducts a bound medical education program followed by obligatory rural service. As a result, the number of 'non-physician communities' (muichiku) nationwide has decreased by 73%; however, the gap between physician concentrations in urban and rural areas has not changed. Therefore, the government has recently implemented a JMU-like contractual program as a form of 'rural quota' at other medical schools in all 47 prefectures. If all the replicated programs work as successfully as JMU, the impact on the geographic distribution of physicians will be substantial. LESSONS LEARNED: The Japanese public-sector-led rural physician securing system could also be effective in countries where rural healthcare provision is the responsibility of the public sector and close cooperation among levels of government is possible.

Characteristics of medical students with rural origin: implications for selective admission policies.

OBJECTIVES: Selective admission policies of medical schools favoring students of rural origin have been implemented in many countries in hope of increasing rural physicians. This study evaluated the characteristics of medical students from rural origins and their choice of future practice location. METHODS: Personal, familial, and academic information of 1929 graduates of Jichi Medical University (JMU), a Japanese medical school with a special mission to produce rural doctors, was collected on admission and graduation between 1972 and 1997, and follow-up information on workplace addresses were collected in 2000, 2004, and 2006. Jichi Medical University has a unique contract system under which all the graduates have the obligation to work in rural areas in exchange for having their tuition fee during their 6 years of undergraduate medical education waived. RESULTS: Subjects with rural origin were more likely to have parents with lower academic background, improve their academic standing throughout undergraduate medical education, and engage in rural practice than those from urban origins. Positive linear relationships between places of upbringing and workplaces were recognized in various geographic/demographic indicators. CONCLUSIONS: The selective admission policy seems to be a reasonable way of increasing the number of rural physicians without placing an undue burden on medical schools.