Evaluation of general practitioners' involvement in the appropriate and good use of prescription drugs

Public health policy is committed to support best practice and the good use of prescription drugs. The law passed in August 2004 to reform social health insurance aims to improve the use, consumption and prescription of medication, essentially to fight against the iatrogenic risk due to drug interaction. The study analyses how general practitioners translate this health policy into practice. 528 general practitioners (GPs) in South-Eastern France participated in a telephone-survey. The questionnaire's objective was to assess GPs' involvement in providing information to patients on the risks of self-medication and on the prevention of drug iatrogenicity. Results show that the identification of drug iatrogenicity is well integrated into practice (87,3% of GPs report doing it frequently), although giving information to patients about risks of self-medication is less regular (46%). Rural GPs are more involved in identifying iatrogenic risks rather than their urban counterparts. Heavy workloads, and lack of time and coordination between prescribing doctors seem to be factors which emerge as strongly hindering GPs' involvement into this type of prevention.