The DFM quarterly data release is an official statistics release. It is produced with full consideration of the standards set out in the Code of Practice for Statistics.
We also release an annual DFM statistical report. You can view the latest version on the Dependency Forming Medicines – England – 2024/25 webpage.
Latest release - 2025/2026 Quarter 3 October to December
Published 5 March 2026.
Key findings:
In England in Q3 2025/26:
There were 16.8 million items for dependency-forming medicines prescribed to an estimated 4.37 million identified patients. This is a 0.6% decrease in the number of items prescribed and a 0.4% decrease in the number of identified patients compared with Q3 2024/25.
Opioid drugs were the most prescribed dependency-forming medicines, with 9.78 million items at a cost of £64.1 million.
The cost of dependency-forming medicines prescribed was £80.0 million. This represents a 12% decrease from Q3 2024/25.
Prescribing of dependency-forming medicines was most prevalent in female patients aged 60 to 64 years, with an estimated 292,000 identified patients.
The most deprived areas had 1.77 times as many identified patients receiving dependency-forming medications as the least deprived areas.
Resource list:
The 2025/26 Quarter 3 summary tables contain data from April 2015 to December 2025.
Quarter 3 2025/2026 summary tables (Excel: 2.5 MB)
Pre-release access list (HTML)
Background
You can find more information on what the data in this publication covers, and what methodology has been used, in the DFM background information and methodology note.
Background information and methodology note (HTML)
Previous releases
In line with our revisions and corrections policy, all data can be updated when new information becomes available that relates to a period already published. You should always use the latest release. Previous releases have been included for reference.
2025/2026
Quarter 2 July to September - published 4 December 2025:
Quarter 2 2025/2026 summary tables (Excel: 2.41MB)
Quarter 1 April to June - published 11 September 2025:
Quarter 1 2025/2026 summary tables (Excel: 2.35MB)
2024/2025
Quarter 4 January to March - published 31 July 2025:
Quarter 4 2024/2025 summary tables (Excel: 2.32MB)
Quarter 3 October to December - published 6 March 2025:
Quarter 3 2024/2025 summary tables (Excel: 2.26MB)
Quarter 2 July to September - published 5 December 2024:
Quarter 2 2024/2025 summary tables (Excel: 2.20MB)
Quarter 1 April to June - published 5 September 2024:
Quarter 1 2024/2025 summary tables (Excel: 2.14MB)
Feedback
We are collecting feedback about our publications. You can complete a short survey to help us make our statistical releases more useful and accessible.
The survey takes about 5 minutes to complete.
All responses will remain anonymous, and you will not be identifiable in any report we produce.
You can view our privacy policy to see how your data is used and stored.
Contact us
If you have any questions, comments, or would like more information you can email [email protected].