Journal of evaluation in clinical practice
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Peer feedback is well placed to play a key role in satisfying educational and governance standards in general practice. Although the participation of general practitioners (GPs) as reviewers of evidence will be crucial to the process, the professional, practical and emotional issues associated with peer review are largely unknown. This study explored the experiences of GP reviewers who make educational judgements on colleagues' significant event analyses (SEAs) in an established peer feedback system. ⋯ Acting as a peer reviewer is perceived by this group of GPs to be an important professional duty. However, the difficulties, emotions and tensions they experience when making professional judgements on aspects of colleagues' work need to be considered when developing a feasible and rigorous system of educational feedback. This is especially important if peer review is to facilitate the 'external verification' of evidence for appraisal and governance.
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As the prescribing of drugs in secondary care is known to influence prescribing in primary care and because an understanding of prescribers' reasoning is essential for evaluating prescribing appropriateness, the aim of this study was to investigate secondary care doctors' views of appropriate prescribing, using qualitative individual interviews. ⋯ The hospital doctors brought up continuous review as a necessary part of appropriate prescribing. Thus, from the prescribers' point of view, this time perspective should be explicitly incorporated in definitions of appropriate prescribing, in addition to individualization of treatment and cost considerations.