title: The assessment by doctors of the effectiveness of drugs.
abstract: There was no significant difference between the assessments by two groups of randomly-selected general practitioners on the effectiveness of the drug treatment for 19 common clinical conditions. The treatment of simple iron deficiency anaemia was considered the most effective and gained the highest consensus. Least effective, but not matched by worst consensus, was the drug treatment for obesity. The most widespread disagreement among the practitioners was for the effectiveness of the drug treatment of gastroenteritis.
mesh_terms: D004358:Drug Therapy / Q000592:standards*; D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D005194:Family Practice; D006801:Humans; D006113:United Kingdom