Evaluating the UK’s first national prescribing assessment for GPs in training

Background GP trainees may not have experienced a systematic and comprehensive education in safe prescribing. Therefore, a self-assessment prescribing review was developed.

Aim To determine whether the assessment was feasible, had face validity, and did not disadvantage particular groups of participants.

Design & setting All full-time UK trainees who commenced their final year of GP training in August 2019 undertook the prescribing assessment along with their trainers, after which they completed an on-line anonymous feedback questionnaire.

Method The questionnaire completed by trainees sought their opinions of the assessment, and collected ethnicity and disability data. The trainer questionnaire was similar but did not include any demographic information.

Results The questionnaire was completed by 1,741 trainees and 1,576 trainers. There was no evidence that ethnicity and disability were related to aspects of the review. Most of the trainees (76.4%, n=1330) and trainers (82.0%, n=1293) agreed or strongly agreed that the prescribing review was helpful for assessing and learning about the trainee’s prescribing. However, most participants (63.2%, n=1092) took more than 4 hours to review their prescriptions. A majority of trainees (90.2%, n=1571) reported that completing the assessment had resulted in a change in their prescribing practice.

Conclusion The majority of trainers and trainees reported that the prescribing assessment was helpful. We were not able to assess whether there had been an actual change in practice that resulted in an error reduction.