BMJ  2005;330:1332 (4 June), doi:10.1136/bmj.330.7503.1332-a

Letter

Consumer advertising and doctors' prescribing

Doctors and patients alike need to be empowered by information to improve quality of care

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR—The most interesting result from the study reported by Gottlieb is not that patients' requests influence the choice of treatment, which is good to hear, but that minimal acceptable care was given in only 56% of cases where the patient made no request for drugs (general or specific).¹ Given type 1 and type 2 errors,² advertising directly to consumers seems to help to generate correct treatment more than it leads to incorrect treatment (inappropriate choice of drug).

My immediate reaction is not to recommend advertising directly to consumers (there are far too many caveats to be applied) but to query why clinicians needed to be prompted to provide a minimal level of care. This is not to pillory doctors, who have much to contend with (including "standard patients"), but to consider whether we need improvements in the use of care protocols and decision-support systems to improve the quality . . . [Full text of this article]

Judge Institute of Management, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 1AG peter.singleton@chi-group.com

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