Two papers in the Journal this month examine patterns of prescribing practice. With established clinical guidelines for the management of individuals with treatment-resistant schizophrenia in mind, Howes et al (pp. 481–485) reviewed prescribing practices prior to commencement of clozapine for a sample of patients managed within one mental health service. The authors found evidence of a signific...

INTRODUCTION Antimicrobial resistance is a major public health threat driven by inappropriate antibiotic use, mainly in general practice and for respiratory tract infections. In Belgium, the quality of general practitioners' (GPs) antibiotic prescribing is low. To improve antibiotic use, we need a better understanding of this quality problem and corresponding interventions. A general practition...

s/2005_40.shtml (accessed 26 September 2006). 40. Child D, Cantrill JA. Hospital doctors perceived barriers to pharmacist prescribing. International Journal of Pharmacy Practice 1999;7:230–7. 41. Child D. Hospital nurses’ perceptions of pharmacist prescribing. British Journal of Nursing 2001:10(1):48–54.References

BACKGROUND In recent years there have been concerns regarding the prescribing of antipsychotic drugs to patients with dementia in nursing homes, due to adverse effects, inappropriate indications and insufficient review. Our practice decided to look at this difficult area more closely. AIM The aim of this audit was to assess whether our prescribing of antipsychotic drugs in nursing homes was a...

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BACKGROUND It has been suggested that the employment of pharmacists in general practice might moderate the growth in prescribing costs. However, empirical evidence for this proposition has been lacking. We report the results of a controlled trial of pharmacist intervention in United Kingdom general practice. AIM To determine whether intervention practices made savings relative to controls. ...

OBJECTIVE To develop a consensus-based list of inappropriate practices in prescribing for elderly people. DESIGN Mail survey of a 32-member national panel. SETTING Academic medical centres across Canada. PARTICIPANTS Thirty-two specialists selected arbitrarily, including 7 clinical pharmacologists, 9 geriatricians, 8 family practitioners and 8 pharmacists. OUTCOME MEASURES Consensus tha...

OBJECTIVES To develop valid, reliable indicators of the appropriateness of long-term prescribing in general practice medical records in the United Kingdom. DESIGN A nominal group was used to identify potential indicators of appropriateness of prescribing. Their face and content validity were subsequently assessed in a two round Delphi exercise. Feasibility and reliability between raters were ...

OBJECTIVES Overutilisation of antibiotics may contribute to the emergence of antimicrobial drug resistance, a growing international concern. This study aimed to analyse the performance of UK general practices with respect to antibiotic prescribing for respiratory tract infections (RTIs) among young and middle-aged adults. SETTING Data are reported for 568 UK general practices contributing to ...

OBJECTIVE To assess the effect of a clinical decision support system (CDSS) integrated into an electronic health record (EHR) on antibiotic prescribing for acute respiratory infections (ARIs) in primary care. MATERIALS AND METHODS Quasi-experimental design with nine intervention practices and 61 control practices in the Practice Partner Research Network, a network of practices which all use t...