Prescribing preferences in rapid tranquillisation: a survey in Belgian psychiatrists and emergency physicians

BMC Research Notes

Manuel Morrens⁶  Bernard Sabbe⁵  Guido Pieters²  Koen Titeca¹  Leen Vandenbussche⁷  Barry Dekeyser⁴  Hella Demunter²  Jürgen De Fruyt⁸  Ella Roelant³  Chris Bervoets⁹ 

[1] AZ Groeninge, Kortrijk, Belgium;UPC KULeuven, Campus Kortenberg, Louvain, Belgium;StatUa Center for Statistics, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium;AZ Herentals, Herentals, Belgium;PZ Sint Norbertus, Duffel, Belgium;PZ Boechout, Boechout, Belgium;UZ Gent, Ghent, Belgium;AZ Sint Jan Brugge-Oostende AV, Brugge, Belgium;UPC KULeuven, Campus Gasthuisberg, Louvain, Belgium

关键词: Guidelines;    Emergency psychiatry;    Rapid tranquillisation;    Agitation;   

Others  :  1232417
DOI  :  10.1186/s13104-015-1172-2

 received in 2014-08-12, accepted in 2015-05-13,  发布年份 2015

【 摘 要 】

Background

The pharmacotherapeutic management of agitation is a common clinical challenge. Pharmacotherapy is frequently used, the use of published guidelines is not known. The purpose of this study was twofold; to describe the prescribing patterns of psychiatrists and emergency physicians and to evaluate to which extent guidelines are used.

Methods

A cross-sectional survey in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium is carried out in 39 psychiatric hospitals, 11 psychiatric wards of a general hospital and 61 emergency departments. All physicians are asked for demographic information, their prescribing preferences, their use of guidelines and the type of monitoring (effectiveness, safety). For the basic demographic data and prescription preferences descriptive statistics are given. For comparing prescribing preferences of the drug between groups Chi square tests (or in case of low numbers Fisher’s exact test) were performed. Mc Nemar test for binomial proportions for matched-pair data was performed to see if the prescription preferences of the participants differ between secluded and non-secluded patients.

Results

550 psychiatrist and emergency physicians were invited. The overall response rate was 20% (n = 108). The number 1 preferred medication classes were antipsychotics (59.3%) and benzodiazepines (40.7%). In non-secluded patients, olanzapine (22.2%), lorazepam (21.3%) and clotiapine (19.4%) were most frequently picked as number 1 choice drug. In secluded patients, clotiapine (21.3%), olanzapine (21.3%) and droperidol (14.8%) were the three most frequently chosen number 1 preferred drugs. Between-group comparisons show that emergency physicians prefer benzodiazepines significantly more than psychiatrists do. Zuclopenthixol and olanzapine show a particular profile in both groups of physicians. Polypharmacy is more frequently used in secluded patients. Published guidelines and safety or outcome monitoring are rarely used.

Conclusions

Our results show that prescription practice in Flanders (Belgium) in acute agitation shows a complex relationship with published guidelines. Prescription preferences differ accordingly to medical specialty. These findings should be taken into account in future research.

【 授权许可】

   
2015 Bervoets et al.

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