title: Drug prescribing for children in general practice. A report from the Møre & Romsdal Prescription Study.
abstract: To investigate general practitioners' drug prescribing patterns for children (0-12 y), an observational, cross-sectional study was conducted in Western Norway. Seven thousand, two hundred and twenty-nine GP-patient contacts during which 5222 drugs were prescribed, were included for analysis. The highest prescribing rates were for boys < 2 y (82.1 prescriptions per 100 contacts). Two-thirds of all prescriptions were for drugs in main groups respiratory system or systemic anti-infectives. The 20 most commonly prescribed agents comprised 75% of all prescriptions. The 20 most frequently recorded diagnoses for prescribing comprised 81% of all. Phenoxymethylpenicillin was the most frequently prescribed antibiotic for otitis, tonsillitis and sinusitis, while erythromycin was used most often for bronchitis and pneumonia. Antibiotics were prescribed in more than 8/10 contacts for tonsillitis, sinusitis, acute bronchitis and pneumonia, and in two-thirds of all contacts for urinary tract infections. Sixty-five percent of the antibiotic prescriptions for urinary tract infections were for co-trimoxazole.
authors.affiliation: Department of Public Health and Primary Health Care, University of Bergen, Norway.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Straand
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Rokstad
authors.forename: U
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Heggedal
mesh_terms: D016009:Chi-Square Distribution; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D016001:Confidence Intervals; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D011307:Drug Prescriptions / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004363:Drug Utilization; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D009664:Norway; D010821:Physicians, Family; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians'; D012737:Sex Factors