DOES A COMPUTERIZED PRICE COMPARISON MODULE REDUCE PRESCRIBING COSTS IN GENERAL-PRACTICE

Method. We performed a controlled follow-up study on antecedent data b efore and after intervention. A questionnaire was administered to the intervention group at the introduction and 1 year later. Data on presc ribing were collected in the database of the Health Insurance Aarhus C ounty, as a normal routine for accounting. The GPs were not aware of t he ongoing cost supervision study. Additional cost information softwar e was introduced on 1 January 1993 to 20 practices with 28 GPs. The so ftware assisted the GPs in a semiautomatic way to identify and prescri be the cheapest drugs. The subjects comprised 158 practices including 231 GPs in Aarhus County, Denmark. Questionnaires were sent to the 20 intervention practices. The main outcome measures were prescribed DDD, reimbursement for prescribed drugs, and reimbursement per prescribed DDD quarterly during 1992 and 1993. Results. Compared with the control s there were no changes in prescribed DDD, reimbursement for prescribe d drugs, and reimbursement per prescribed DDD in the intervention grou p after the introduction of the module. Conclusion. Simply giving a ra ndom group of GPs computer assistance to choose less expensive drugs d id not reduce expenditure per DDD. Cost containment procedures should be more intensive than just giving the doctors a computer-assisted dec ision aid.