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Program to Improve Antibiotic Prescribing in Primary Care

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Improving Use of Medicines and Medical Tests in Primary Care

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Abstract

Many countries are trying to reduce prescription and use of antibiotics. This Chapter outlines a five-year program, implemented in Australia from 2013–2018. The aim was to reduce antibiotic prescribing in primary care by 25% and there was a focus on the management of respiratory infections. Formative evaluation pointed to diagnostic uncertainty and patient expectation as important drivers of prescribing, and a series of key messages and interventions were designed to support both clinicians and patients to use fewer antibiotics. Messaging for health professionals and consumers included the concept that individuals can make a difference and that every prescription matters. Prescribing feedback (with and without audit components), patient action plans and use of media were included in the behavioural interventions. Program acceptance, changes in knowledge and attitudes and changes in prescribing were all trending very positively when the program had an interim evaluation in 2016. This included an overall reduction in antibiotic prescribing of 19%. In addition, ongoing evaluation proved useful in modifying and improving program delivery throughout implementation period.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme significantly subsidizes prescriptions for the vast majority of medicines in Australia. It is a national insurance scheme for medicines, available to all citizens and it is funded by the Commonwealth Government.

  2. 2.

    See Chap. 2 for additional description of interventions.

  3. 3.

    MedicineInsight practices by 2018 comprised over 600 general practices that voluntarily contributed de-identified data from their clinical management system to the MedicineInsight program for quality improvement purposes. This represents about 10% of all general practices.

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Acknowledgements

I wish to acknowledge the work of NPS MedicineWise personnel who designed, conducted and evaluated this program. In particular, I recognize the contribution of Jane London, Clare Weston and Jonathan Dartnell and their teams in designing and delivering the interventions. Suzanne Blogg oversaw the evaluation and Fred Wu undertook the Bayesian analysis to demonstrate changes in prescribing. Kylie Easton led the formative evaluation team that helped elucidate the drivers for change.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia

    Lynn Maria Weekes

  2. Health Strategy and Sciences, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    Lynn Maria Weekes

  3. NPS MedicineWise, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    Clare Weston

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  1. Lynn Maria Weekes
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  2. Clare Weston
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Correspondence to Lynn Maria Weekes .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia

    Lynn Maria Weekes

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Weekes, L.M., Weston, C. (2020). Program to Improve Antibiotic Prescribing in Primary Care. In: Weekes, L. (eds) Improving Use of Medicines and Medical Tests in Primary Care. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-2333-5_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-2333-5_8

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