Impact of Australia’s 60-Day Dispensing Policy on Medicine Use: An Interrupted Time Series of the Stage 1 Roll-out

Objective

To evaluate the real-world impact of Stage 1 of Australia’s 60-day dispensing policy on medicine utilisation and contextualise changes in dispensing with medicine shortages.

Methods

We conducted an interrupted time series analysis of aggregated national monthly dispensing data from the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and Repatriation Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme for the 247 medicines included in Stage 1 of the 60-day dispensing policy. Data from January 2020 to October 2025 were analysed, with September 2023 defined as policy implementation. Linear regression assessed changes in monthly dispensing trends before and after implementation, accounting for autocorrelation and seasonal variation. A relative change of at least ±5% in the post-intervention dispensing slope compared with the pre-intervention slope was prespecified as a potentially clinically meaningful change. Therapeutic Goods Administration shortage reports were used to contextualise observed changes.

Results

Of 247 medicines, 131 (53%) had increasing and 116 (47%) had decreasing post-intervention dispensing trends; of which 86 (66%) and 71 (61%), were statistically significant, respectively. However, only 8 medicines (3%) demonstrated at least ±5% relative change in dispensing slope, six of which had reported shortages. Medicine-specific changes coincided with shortages, product deletions and therapeutic substitution, complicated attribution of changes to the 60-day dispensing policy.

Conclusion

Stage 1 of Australia’s 60-day dispensing policy was not associated with widespread changes in dispensing for most included medicines. Limited changes were plausibly influenced by concurrent shortages and other supply-related events. These findings provide reassurance that extended dispensing did not result in major increases in medicine utilisation at the population level, although continued monitoring is warranted as policy uptake expands.

Short summary for non-experts

Australia introduced 60-day dispensing in September 2023, allowing eligible patients to receive up to two months of some medicines at one time. We examined whether this changed overall usage of medicines across Australia.

We found that for almost all of the 247 medicines included in the first stage of the policy, there was no meaningful change in usage after 60-day dispensing was introduced. Only eight medicines showed a potentially meaningful change, and most of these changes occurred alongside medicine shortages or other supply problems. Overall, the findings suggest that 60- day dispensing did not lead to major increases in medicine usage, although ongoing monitoring is important as the policy expands.