Bakgrunn: Misbruk av vanedannende legemidler er et viktig folkehelseproblem. Enkelte pasienter går fra lege til lege og driver såkalt legeshopping for å skaffe seg mest mulig av denne typen legemidler. Dette er et problem i forhold til å kunne begrense legemiddelmisbruket i befolkningen. Fastlegeordningen, som ble innført i Norge i 2001, er blant annet ment å skulle begrense mulighetene til legeshopping. Det er ikke tidligere gjort studier som kan kartlegge omfanget av legeshopping i en befolkning, verken i Norge eller andre land. FORMÅL: Kartlegge omfanget av legeshopping i befolkningen i Norge, og forsøke å klarlegge i hvilken grad bruk av flere leger kan skyldes shopping etter legemidler eller andre årsaker. MATERIALE OG METODE: Studere data fra det norske Reseptregisteret (NorPD) for kalenderåret 2004, som blant annet viser antallet leger benyttet, mengde utlevert av det aktuelle legemiddelet og samtidig mengde utlevert av benzodiazepiner og opioider for alle brukere av de vanedannende legemidlene diazepam, karisoprodol og kodein kombinasjoner sammenlignet med alle brukere av de ikke-vanedannende legemidlene esomeprazol, metformin og salbutamol. RESULTATER: De aller fleste pasienter bruker kun en eller to leger for å få utlevert samme legemiddel i løpet av ett kalenderår. Andelen som bruker tre eller flere leger er imidlertid mer enn dobbelt så høy for de vanedannende legemidlene som for de ikke-vanedannende, og for de som bruker fem eller flere leger, er andelen nesten ti ganger større. Med økende antall leger som er benyttet, er dessuten økningen i både utlevert mengde av legemidlet og samtidig mengde utlevert av benzodiazepiner og opioider langt mer uttalt for de vanedannende legemidlene enn for de ikke-vanedannende. KONKLUSJON: Det foregår etter innføringen av fastlegeordningen fortsatt en begrenset, men klar legeshopping blant pasienter som ønsker å få tak i mest mulig av vanedannende legemidler. Dette forhold må tas alvorlig av både de forskrivende legene og helsemyndighetene. / BACKGROUND: Abuse of prescription drugs is an important public health issue. Some patients go from one physician to another in so-called doctor-shopping (or physician-shopping) with the intention to have as much as possible of addictive drugs prescribed. This is a problem when trying to restrict prescription drug abuse in the population. The Regular General Practitioner (RGP) Scheme which was introduced in Norway in 2001 had among other things the intention to counteract doctor-shopping. So far there are no studies in Norway or other countries that have presented estimates of the proportions of patients that practice doctor-shopping. AIM: To explore the extent of doctor-shopping in the population in Norway and try to unveil if the use of several doctors is primarily a prescription drug shopping or if it has other reasons. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Data from The Norwegian Prescription Database (NorPD) for the year of 2004 was studied. The register includes information on the number of doctors used by individual patients and the amount of drug dispensed. There is also information about concomitant use of opioids and benzodiazepines. Users of the addictive drugs diazepam, carisoprodol and codeine combinations were compared to users of the non-addictive drugs esomeprazole, metformin and salbutamol. RESULTS: Most patients use only one or two doctors for prescription of the same drug over a period of one year. However the proportion of patients who uses three or more doctors for the addictive drugs is more than twice the comparable proportion of patients using the non-addictive drugs. For those who uses five or more doctors the proportion is nearly ten times larger. The amount of dispensed drug increases considerably more by increasing number of doctors used for users of the addictive drugs than for the users of the non-addictive drugs, as do the amount of concomitantly dispensed opioids and benzodiazepines. CONCLUSION: Also after the introduction of the Regular General Practitioner (RGP) Scheme in Norway doctor-shopping is still going on to a limited but significant extent by patients who appear to have the intention to get as much as possible of addictive drugs. This is a public health issue that has to be taken seriously by both prescribing doctors and health authorities. / <p>ISBN 978-91-85721-60-3</p>

Der medizinische Fortschritt führte zu einer bis heute nicht abgeschlossenen Spezialisierung und Differenzierung medizinischer Fächer und hat zur Folge, daß der Arzt bei der Behandlung auf interärztliche Kooperation angewiesen ist. Der Patient kehrt jedoch häufig nach erfolgter fachärztlicher Behandlung nicht zum Hausarzt zurück, oder das Resultat wird nicht zurückgemeldet. Die Studie hatte die Aufgabe, diese Defizite in der ärztlichen Kooperation aufzudecken und die Effektivität interärztlicher Kooperationsbeziehungen zu untersuchen. Ziele waren die Beschreibung von Art und Umfang der außerhausärztlichen Behandlungen, die Untersuchung der Vollständigkeit von Überweisungsprozessen und die Analyse von Determinanten auf das Rückmeldeverhalten. In einer hausärztlich tätigen internistischen Praxis wurden die schriftlichen Mitteilungen und die Einträge über externe Behandlungen in der Befunddatei des Praxiscomputers aus einem Jahr erhoben. Zusätzlich standen aus einer Patientendatenbank retrospektiv die Daten aller Konsultationen in den letzten 3 Jahren für die Analyse zur Verfügung. Für über die Hälfte der Ein- und Überweisungen konnte keine Rückmeldung gefunden werden. Auf der anderen Seite hatten zwei Drittel der Mitteilungen keine Überweisung als Grundlage. Ein Fünftel der Informationen über externe Behandlungen, die den Hausarzt erreichten, resultierten aus Patienteninformationen während der Anamnese. Den größten Einfluß auf das Überweisungsgeschehen hatte die Häufigkeit des Hausarztbesuchs. Patienten mit häufigen Besuchen hatten öfter Überweisungen und Rückmeldungen und einen höheren Anteil vollständiger Überweisungsprozesse. / The medical progress led to an ongoing specialization and differentiation of medical specialities. As a result the physician depends on co-operation with colleagues. But the patient often doesn't return to the general practitioner after consultation of the consultant or the results are not reported back. The task of the study was to reveal deficits of physicians' co-operation and to examine the effectiveness of physicians' relationships. Aims were description of type and extent of consultants treatment, completeness of referrals and analysis of determinants for the feedback behaviour. Written reports and entries in the electronic patient-file about treatments of other physicians as the general practitioner were examined in a general practice during one year. In addition the data of a database, which contains all consultations in the last three years, were available for the analysis. More than half of the referrals didn't have a feedback. On the other hand two third of the feedback information don't base on a general practitioner's referral. One fifth of the information, which reaches the general practitioner, were information by patients during the anamnesis. The frequency of general practitioners consultations had highest influence on the referral process. Patients with frequent consultations had more often referrals, feedback information and a higher proportion of complete referral processes.

L’objectif de cette thèse est de conceptualiser, à partir de l’exploitation des données de remboursement de soins de l’Assurance Maladie, les différentes trajectoires de recours aux soins relatives à la prise en charge d’une pathologie chronique (asthme), et d’étudier les déterminants de ces trajectoires du point de vue du profil et du comportement subséquent du prescripteur de soins. L’étude de la relation entre le comportement prescriptif et la trajectoire de soins est appréhendée par des techniques de modélisation et d’analyses multivariées. L’objectif sous-jacent est d’évaluer, d’un point de vue médico-économique, l’impact de la typologie des prescripteurs (caractéristiques des offreurs de soins) sur les différentes trajectoires de soins suivies par les patients atteints de la pathologie définie supra. Les caractéristiques susceptibles d’identifier une typologie de prescripteur correspondent aux variables influant sur le comportement prescriptif, au sens large, du médecin (âge, sexe, durée d’exercice, type d’exercice, etc.). La question principale de la thèse est celle de l’effet régulateur de l’incitation économique, instaurée par le parcours de soins coordonnés (réforme de l’Assurance Maladie, août 2004), sur les trajectoires de soins, réellement observées, de patients atteints de pathologies chroniques. Les corollaires sont : Le déremboursement des actes hors parcours de soins coordonnés peut-il avoir un impact significatif sur la trajectoire empirique de prise en charge du patient ? Le profil du prescripteur d’actes médicaux a-t-il, toutes choses égales par ailleurs, un effet sur le respect ou non de la trajectoire de soins référentielle admise par le parcours de soins coordonnés ? Quels sont les déterminants principaux du non respect de cette trajectoire référentielle, du point de vue de l’analyse des caractéristiques des couples « médecin – patient» ? / The objective of this thesis is to conceptualize, starting from the exploitation of the refunding data of cares from the Sickness insurance, the various trajectories of cares recourses introduced by chronic diseases as asthma, and to study their determinants by analysing the profile and the subsequent behavior of the general practitioner. The study of the relation between the prescriptive behavior and the trajectory of cares is carried out by different multivariate analyses. The other objective is to evaluate, from a pharmacoeconomic point of view, the impact of the general practitioner characteristics on the various trajectories of cares followed by the patients with chronic diseases. The characteristics likely to identify a typology of practitioners correspond to the variables influencing the prescriptive behavior (age, sex, duration of exercise, type of exercise, etc). The principal question of the thesis is that of the regulating effect of the economic incentive, rested on the coordinated care pathway (reform of the Sickness insurance, August 2004), on the trajectories of cares, really observed by the chronic patients. The corollaries are: Does the no-reimbursement of some medical acts, not considered in the coordinated care pathway, have a significant impact on the empirical recourse of the patient? Does the profile of the general practitioner have an effect on the respect or not of the allowed trajectory of cares classified by the French reform? Which are the principal determinants of disregarding this referential trajectory, by notably analysing the “practitioner - patient” characteristics?

No description available.

No description available.

Benzodiazepines have been widely prescribed since the 1960s for the management of adverse symptoms related to anxiety, depression, and sleep problems. They were regarded as an efficacious medication when compared with their predecessor, barbiturates. Within 10 years of their introduction, concerns began to be raised regarding their potential to produce dependence and withdrawal symptoms when ceased, including symptoms not present prior to their being prescribed. Subsequent research focussed on establishing effective strategies to ameliorate the adverse symptoms experienced even when the daily intake was slowly reduced. The aim of the work undertaken for this doctorate was to establish whether there was a role for cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) in benzodiazepine cessation. The initial step in conducting the research for this doctorate was to obtain a detailed understanding of the current state of research on benzodiazepine cessation. Study 1 therefore focussed on establishing the effectiveness of treatment approaches used to assist individuals to cease benzodiazepine use. A Meta-analysis of treatment strategies undertaken in general practice and outpatient settings established that brief intervention resulted in superior cessation rates at post-treatment than routine care. Gradual dose reduction plus CBT was slightly superior to gradual dose reduction alone. However, substitutive pharmacotherapies in combination with gradual dose reduction did not result in a superior outcome to gradual dose reduction alone, and substitutive pharmacotherapy plus abrupt benzodiazepine cessation was less effective than gradual dose reduction. While, providing CBT in conjunction with gradual dose reduction offered a superior outcome than gradual dose reduction alone, current evidence does not identify the CBT strategies that contributed to the superior outcome. The next step in the development of the CBT intervention involved obtaining a deep appreciation of the issues relating to cessation from the perspective of General Practitioners (GPs) and Benzodiazepine Users (BzUs). Accordingly, Study 2 administered semi-structured interviews about benzodiazepine use and its cessation to 28 GPs and 23 BzUs. Responses were analysed using the Consensual Qualitative Research approach, as it enabled comparisons to be made between the views of the two groups of interviewees. The study identified commonality between GPs and BzUs on reasons for commencing use, the role of dependence in continued use, and the importance of lifestyle change in its cessation. BzUs felt there was greater need for GPs to routinely advise patients about non-pharmacological management of their problems and potential adverse consequences of long-term use before prescribing benzodiazepines. Few GPs had assisted a patient to cease use reportedly due to the required time and the expectation of a poor outcome. There was a perception that patients wanted a pharmacological solution to their problems. A critical gap in assessment instruments that are needed for a comprehensive assessment of the outcomes from a treatment trial was identified. In particular, there was no measure of benzodiazepine expectancy or self-efficacy concerning maintenance of benzodiazepine dose reduction. Therefore, Study 3 adapted existing expectancy and self-efficacy measures form other substance domains to verify their applicability to benzodiazepines. Current BzUs (n = 155) were invited to complete two questionnaires either online or via hard copy. Principal component analysis (PCA) of a newly developed Benzodiazepine Expectancy Questionnaire (BEQ) resulted an 18-item, 2-factor scale, while a Benzodiazepine Refusal Self Efficacy Questionnaire (BRSEQ) formed a 16-item, 4-factor scale, Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in a second sample (n = 139) confirmed these internal structures, reducing the BEQ to 12 items and the BRSEQ to 14 items respectively. The qualitative study suggested that many GPs would be reluctant to engage in psychological support for benzodiazepine cessation and it was evident that specialist services would be unable to provide substantial support especially in rural and remote areas. Accordingly, it was decided to develop a treatment that was remotely delivered. The initial pilot used a correspondence-based approach, delivered via the postal service. Study 4 comprised a small pilot comparing GP managed gradual dose reduction, plus CBT via mail (M-CBT), which was either delivered immediately (IM-CBT) or after 3 months (DM-CBT). Despite substantial efforts over a 2 year period to recruit GPs and BzUs, only 6 received the allocated intervention. It was decided to trial the intervention as an internet-delivered program to enhance its accessibility to BzUs. Access to the program was promoted through the project website and links from high profile support websites. Study 5 was an uncontrolled trial of internet-based CBT (I-CBT). Access was provided to all newsletters, although, participants were given a suggested sequence for access. Despite placement on the internet and cross-listing on several key websites, the study still only recruited 35 participants (3 of which received the program by mail). Of the 32 undertaking the program via the internet, 21 completed the 3-month assessments and 14 the 6-month assessments. Eight participants reduced their weekly benzodiazepine intake by at least 50%, by 3 months, with five ceasing use at 6 months. A significant increase in self-efficacy, and a decrease in depressive symptoms and dependence were seen. Providing CBT either via mail or the internet assisted some participants to reduce or cease long-term benzodiazepine use. Recruitment to both M-CBT and I-CBT was limited, despite substantial attempts to market the intervention. The studies undertaken for this doctorate make a unique contribution to improving treatment outcomes for people wishing to cease long-term benzodiazepine use. They also provide direction for more extensive studies to definitively establish the nature of effective treatment. The current evidence clearly supports the importance of gradual dose reduction and the role of CBT in further improving treatment outcomes. However, engagement of both BzUs and GPs remains challenging. Remote delivery of CBT via mail or the internet may assist with improving access to CBT, but it does not solve the problem of GP and BzU engagement. An effective system-wide program to address long-term benzodiazepine use will require that incentives for GP involvement (a disincentive for long-term prescription) are in place.

The Public Attitude towards Preventive Oncology Examinations The object of this paper is to find out how laic and health professional public uses the potential of preventive oncology examinations and to uncover the barriers in use of these programs from the point of view of the laic and professional public. The public attitude towards preventive oncology examinations is more important these days as the incidence of oncology diseases is growing. Prevention is considered the principal in modern medicine, also from an economic point of view. The attitude of society towards its health is one of problematic public health areas, the attitude of self-responsibility and the underestimated meaning of primary prevention. Moreover, there is a psychological problem related to oncological diseases: the fear of positive findings and the fear of the disease itself which is traditionally connected with incurability, cruel pain and inevitable death. This notion is no longer true. A dictatorial doctor{\crq}s approach to patients in the past has been replaced with cooperative and more equal relation, where the patient takes part in decision making. However, doctors are too busy to find the proper way and proper extent of informing the patient or these doctors often underestimate the importance of a good way of giving this kind of information. This thesis presents current preventive care offered in the Czech Republic and it shows the negative bias towards cancer which is a stumbling block to a more successful fight against oncology diseases. This research was undertaken amongst laic and health public. Quantitative data collection was used in the form of questionnaires. The research file is made up of men and women over 18 years, with or without health occupation. The hypothesis was not proven that laic public use preventive oncology examinations more than health public. The laics use these programs less mostly due to lack of awareness about them. One of the most common obstacles in using preventive programs is the misunderstanding of prevention itself, when people contact a doctor only when they have problems. The results have also shown that laics are not satisfied with the activity of doctors in informing them and that laic public search for information is done less actively. This thesis can be used as a foundation for further discussion about problems of informing the public about preventive programs and for future education of health personnel within oncology matters.

No description available.

This thesis aimed to explore personal definitions and experiences of recovery from psychosis for service users (SUs) and general practitioners (GPs), as well as indentify factors which might promote or hinder recovery in a primary care context, and identify interventions which might be required to enhance the promotion of recovery in primary care. A review of existing literature pertaining to the concept of 'recovery' was undertaken, and differing conceptualisations of 'recovery' were analysed and synthesised through the use of a Critical Interpretive Synthesis. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 24 GPs and 20 SUs. Two mixed focus groups were also carried out as follow-ups with 5 GPs and 5 SUs. The data was analysed using a modified grounded theory approach. Factors reported to promote recovery in primary care included: autonomy, choice, and empowerment for SUs in treatment decisions; signposting of peer-supported groups and services by GPs; enhancement of SUs' social support networks by GPs; advocacy and independent analysis provided by GPs; a whole-person approach to recovery (social and biomedical); less stigmatising environment of primary care; and families of SUs and GPs working together in collaboration, often having built up a trusting relationship over time through continuity of care. The following potential interventions for enhancing recovery in primary care were identified: SU-led training for GPs regarding psychosis knowledge and attitudes; raising GPs' awareness of local services and groups by encouraging service managers and group organisers to visit GP practices; establishing GP peer supervision forums; improving access to GPs with a Special Interest in Mental Health (GPwSIs); shifting a greater degree of responsibility for recovery from psychosis to primary care from secondary care; reinforcing amongst GPs an awareness of the important role which primary care can play in promoting recovery; facilitating continuity of care within large practices where feasible; and encouraging GPs to alert SUs to seriousness of potential side-effects of medication before and during treatment. The implications of the findings for policy, practice, and future research were discussed.

Theme of the master’s thesis is new building of nursing home that will serve residents of the town Hronov and its closer surroundings. The building is brick and the roof is designed as a horizontal. The building consists of a basement and three floors. Plot is situated in a slightly sloping terrain. It is an object of Housing and accommodation. On the 1st floor there is general practitioner, hairdressing and pedicure that serve the public. The building is designed with regard to persons with reduced mobility. There is a parking place next to building.