Impact of a Communication Toolkit on Antibiotic Prescribed by General Practitioners: a Randomised Trial

Impact of a Public Commitment Charter Associated With Patient Information Leaflets on Antibiotics Prescribed by General Practitioners

This study is a pragmatic, randomised, controlled, before-after interventional study conducted in one region in France in primary care. The GPs in the intervention group will receive a public commitment charter, a non prescription pad and a patient information leaflet to be used when antibiotics are prescribed, while the control group will be not aware of the intervention.

Antimicrobial resistance is a major public health threat and the overuse of antibiotics contributes to its development.

In France, outpatient antibiotic use remains above the European average. Ninety percent of antibiotics are prescribed to outpatients and 70% of these are prescribed by general practitioners.

Inclusion Criteria:

• working in the Lorraine region in France
• prescribing more than 25 antibiotic items per 100 patients without a chronic illness, aged 16 to 65 years
• proportion of patients treated with critical antibiotics exceeding 27% (among patients treated with antibiotics)

Exclusion Criteria:

• practicing exclusively alternative medicine, such as homeopathy or acupuncture
• GPs reaching the retirement age in the two years following the beginning of the intervention or who were not working two years before
• GPs who had already displayed a commitment charter promoting antibiotic stewardship in their practice