title: Long-term psychotropic drug prescribing for general practice patients.
abstract: Although 11.3% of patients of an academic general practice unit were prescribed one of the four commonest psychotropic drugs in 1978, only 1.6% received six or more prescriptions. During the following three years further prescriptions for the same drug were issued in 61% of the patient years for which information was available. Most of the frequent recipients were elderly women. Further research is needed into the natural history of conditions for which psychotropic drugs are prescribed in general practice.
mesh_terms: D001315:Australia; D005194:Family Practice; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D011619:Psychotropic Drugs / Q000008:administration & dosage*
chemical_list: D011619:Psychotropic Drugs