ArticleThe British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners2012
Delayed antibiotic prescribing and associated antibiotic consumption in adults with acute cough.
Article in The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 29 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
29 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Prevalence, aetiologies and prognosis of the symptom cough in primary care: a systematic review and meta-analysis.BMC family practice · 2021Pooled it
- Delayed antibiotic prescribing for respiratory tract infections: individual patient data meta-analysis.BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 2021Pooled it
- Variation in antibiotic use among and within different settings: a systematic review.The Journal of antimicrobial chemotherapy · 2018Pooled it
- Using a decision support tool to reduce inappropriate antibiotic use after a delayed prescription.Applied psychology. Health and well-being · 2026Trial
- Effects on antibiotic dispensing rates of interventions to promote delayed prescribing for respiratory tract infections in primary care.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2013Trial
- Unbeneficial effects of not prescribing antibiotics to pediatric patients with acute upper respiratory infection: a descriptive epidemiological study based on a large Japanese medical claim database.Journal of pharmaceutical health care and sciences · 2025Article
- Article
- Antimicrobial Prescribing Patterns in GP Practices in Northern Ireland.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- How, why and when are delayed (back-up) antibiotic prescriptions used in primary care? A realist review integrating concepts of uncertainty in healthcare.BMC public health · 2024Review
- Post-consultation acute respiratory tract infection recovery: a latent class-informed analysis of individual patient data.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2023Article
- Implementation of the delayed antibiotic prescribing strategy. Prospective observation study in primary care.Revista espanola de quimioterapia : publicacion oficial de la Sociedad Espanola de Quimioterapia · 2022Observational
- Public preferences for delayed or immediate antibiotic prescriptions in UK primary care: A choice experiment.PLoS medicine · 2021Article
- Coping With Diagnostic Uncertainty in Antibiotic Prescribing: A Latent Class Study of Primary Care Physicians in Hubei China.Frontiers in public health · 2021Article
- Article
- Delayed Antibiotic Prescription by General Practitioners in the UK: A Stated-Choice Study.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2020Article
- Antimicrobial stewardship in the primary care setting: from dream to reality?BMC family practice · 2020Article
- A Nationwide Survey of Australian General Practitioners on Antimicrobial Stewardship: Awareness, Uptake, Collaboration with Pharmacists and Improvement Strategies.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2020Article
- General practitioners' accounts of negotiating antibiotic prescribing decisions with patients: a qualitative study on what influences antibiotic prescribing in low, medium and high prescribing practices.BMC family practice · 2019Article
- Antibiotic Prescribing Quality in Out-of-Hours Primary Care and Critical Appraisal of Disease-Specific Quality Indicators.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2019Article
- General practitioners' perceptions of delayed antibiotic prescription for respiratory tract infections: A phenomenographic study.PloS one · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
9 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundDelayed antibiotic prescribing is promoted as a strategy to reduce antibiotic consumption, but its use and its effect on antibiotic consumption in routine care is poorly described.
aimTo quantify delayed antibiotic prescribing in adults presenting in primary care with acute cough/lower respiratory tract infection (LRTI), duration of advised delay, consumption of delayed antibiotics, and factors associated with consumption. DESIGN AND
settingProspective observational cohort in general practices in 14 primary care networks in 13 European countries.
methodGPs recorded clinical features and antibiotic prescribing for adults presenting with an acute infective illness with cough as the dominant symptom. Patients recorded their consumption of antibiotics from any source during the 28-day follow up.
resultsTwo hundred and ten (6.3%) of 3368 patients with usable consultation data were prescribed delayed antibiotics. The median recommended delay period was 3 days. Seventy-five (44.4%) of the 169 with consumption data consumed the antibiotic course and a further 18 (10.7%) took another antibiotic during the study period. 50 (29.6%) started their delayed course on the day of prescription. Clinician diagnosis of upper respiratory tract/viral infection and clinician's perception of patient's wanting antibiotics were associated with less consumption of the delayed prescription. Patient's wanting antibiotics was associated with greater consumption.
conclusionDelayed antibiotic prescribing was used infrequently for adults presenting in general practice with acute cough/LRTI. When used, the effect on antibiotic consumption was less than found in most trials. There are opportunities for standardising the intervention and promoting wider uptake.
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