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Dr Gérald Kierzek (Medical Director of Doctissimo)
According to an American study, carrying out medical consultations that are too short would lead to an increased risk of prescription errors. Which is obviously not without risk for the patient…
At a time when doctors and all health professionals have less and less time to devote to their patients, this study appears worrying. It shows the link that exists between a consultation that is too short and the risk of prescription error.
Consultations that last too little time
In this study, American scientists analyzed the work of more than 8,000 doctors, studying 8,119,161 primary care visits for 4,360,445 patients. The objective of the experts was to compare the duration of the visits and the decisions taken at the time of the prescription at the end of the consultation.
The researchers came to different conclusions. They established that the average duration of a consultation is 18 minutes, two minutes more than the average in France. In 2002, the Department of Research, Studies, Evaluation and Statistics (DREES) carried out a survey showing that the average duration of a medical consultation was 16 minutes.
Longer consultations needed for better prescriptions
The second conclusion is more worrying. According to the authors, aShorter visit duration was associated with higher rates of inappropriate antibiotic prescribing for upper respiratory tract infections and inappropriate co-prescribing of opioids and benzodiazepines for patients with painful conditions.
However, the scientists point out that this type of inappropriate prescription has not been observed for other pathologies or reasons for consultations.
Dr Gérald Kierzek: “Doing medicine takes time”
When questioned, Dr. Gérald Kierzek approves the conclusions of this work. “Doing medicine takes time. You have to have the time to take the patient’s history, to ask him questions, to listen to him and that’s why the role of the attending physician, for example, is fundamental, because he knows all this.” says the doctor first.
“Then, time is also needed to examine the patient. Prescribing pills or additional examinations is not doing medicine” he adds. “But unfortunately, two elements are increasingly constraining doctors: medical demography and the fee-for-service system – and therefore the doctor’s remuneration, in fine – which is a system whose operation is inversely proportional to the time spent with of the patient” he concludes.