• Home
• ›
• News
• ›
• BJGP November RCGP 60th Anniversary Edition

BJGP November RCGP 60th Anniversary Edition

Publication date: 25 October 2012

BJGP celebrates 60 years of quality research in primary care

This month the British Journal of General Practice celebrates the start of the 60th Anniversary of the Royal College of General Practitioners and looks to what the future has in store for the profession.

Professor Roger Jones, Editor of the BJGP, discusses contributions that look back over the ways in which the College has supported the development of general practice in the UK and beyond, and ahead to the aspirations the institution has for the future, saying:

“The energy, wisdom, and courage that have driven the RCGP for the last 60 years will be needed more than ever in the challenging times ahead.”

RCGP Chair Dr Clare Gerada and Dr Ben Riley set out a ten-year vision  for general practice in an editorial, with the launch of "The 2022 GP - a call to action" campaign, and argue that more and better-trained GPs are needed in the years ahead, to cope with the increasing numbers of patients with complex health problems who will be managed outside hospital and to preserve access, continuity and co-ordination, particularly for the most vulnerable sections of our patient populations.

Reviewing long-term antidepressants can reduce drug burden: a prospective observational cohort study.  GPs could improve the quality of anti-depressant prescribing by carrying out structured reviews of patients on long-term prescriptions according to Chris Johnston and colleagues from Glasgow. They found that these drug reviews resulted in a change in dosage in a quarter of patients, stopping the drug altogether in 7% and changing to a different anti-depressant in a further number of patients, with significant reductions in prescribing costs.

New research on sore throats could mean that GPs are better able to decide when to prescribe antibiotics. Paul Little and colleagues from Southampton found that the presence of a streptococcal throat infection was much more likely when patients came to the doctor soon after they started to get symptoms, which they perceived as severe, along with the doctor's assessment of the severity of tonsillar inflammation and the presence of fever in the last 24 hours. These new findings may provide valuable guidance on the diagnosis and treatment of strep sore throats in the future.

Ends

Please mention the British Journal of General Practice in any news stories.

All press-released BJGP stories are now made available on an ‘open access’ basis on the BJGP website at www.rcgp.org.uk/bjgp

The BJGP is the leading journal of family medicine in Europe and is distributed free of charge every month to over 46,000 GPs.

Although it is published by the RCGP, it has complete editorial independence. Opinions expressed in the BJGP should not be taken to represent the policy of the RCGP unless this is specifically stated.

Further Information

RCGP Press office - 020 3188 7574/7575/7576
Out of hours: 0203 188 7659
press@rcgp.org.uk

Notes to editor

The Royal College of General Practitioners is a network of more than 46,000 family doctors working to improve care for patients. We work to encourage and maintain the highest standards of general medical practice and act as the voice of GPs on education, training, research and clinical standards.