Trial reportJournal of general internal medicine2008
Factors affecting physicians' responses to patients' requests for antidepressants: focus group study.
Trial report in Journal of general internal medicine, 2008. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Direct-to-Consumer Advertising of Prescription Drugs and the Patient-Prescriber Encounter: A Systematic Review.Health communication · 2020Pooled it
- Getting to "no": strategies primary care physicians use to deny patient requests.Archives of internal medicine · 2010Trial
- Article
- Context factors in clinical decision-making: a scoping review.BMC medical informatics and decision making · 2025Article
- Primary care physician responses to requests by older adults for unnecessary drugs: a qualitative study.BMC primary care · 2022Article
- Do coverage mandates affect direct-to-consumer advertising for pharmaceuticals? Evidence from parity laws.International journal of health economics and management · 2018Article
- The role of emotion in clinical decision making: an integrative literature review.BMC medical education · 2017Review
- "Psychiatry is not a science like others" - a focus group study on psychotropic prescribing in primary care.BMC family practice · 2013Article
- Ethical and epistemic issues in direct-to-consumer drug advertising: where is patient agency?Medicine, health care, and philosophy · 2013Article
- What we talk about when we talk about depression: doctor-patient conversations and treatment decision outcomes.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2012Article
- What about N? A methodological study of sample-size reporting in focus group studies.BMC medical research methodology · 2011Article
- [A model for making shared decisions with the patient].Atencion primaria · 2009Article
- Antidepressant medication adherence: a study of primary care patients.Primary care companion to the Journal of clinical psychiatry · 2009Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundThe ways in which patients' requests for antidepressants affect physicians' prescribing behavior are poorly understood.
objectiveTo describe physicians' affective and cognitive responses to standardized patients' (SPs) requests for antidepressants, as well as the attitudinal and contextual factors influencing prescribing behavior.
designFocus group interviews and brief demographic questionnaires.
participantsTwenty-two primary care physicians in 6 focus groups; all had participated in a prior RCT of the influence of patients' requests on physicians' prescribing. MEASUREMENTS: Iterative review of interview transcripts, involving qualitative coding and thematic analysis.
resultsPhysicians participating in the focus groups were frequently unaware of and denied the degree to which their thinking was biased by patient requests, but were able to recognize such biases after facilitated reflection. Common affective responses included annoyance and empathy. Common cognitive reactions resulted in further diagnostic inquiry or in acquiescing to the patient's demands to save time or build the patient-clinician relationship. Patients' requests for medication prompted the participants to err on the side of overtreating versus careful review of clinical indications. Lack of time and participants' attitudes--toward the role of the patient and the pharmaceutical ads--also influenced their responses, prompting them to interpret patient requests as diagnostic clues or opportunities for efficiency.
conclusionsThis study provides a taxonomy of affective and cognitive responses to patients' requests for medications and the underlying attitudes and contextual factors influencing them. Improved capacity for moment-to-moment self-awareness during clinical reasoning processes may increase the appropriateness of prescribing.
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