by Our News Desk

DOCTORS warned yesterday that taking disciplinary action against GPs who overprescribe antibiotics would be “counterproductive and unhelpful.”

Up to 10 million prescriptions for antibiotics are dished out unnecessarily each year, according to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice), increasing the risk of bugs becoming drug-resistant.

The health watchdog, which has produced new guidelines on antibiotic prescribing for the NHS, said patients were partly to blame for pressuring or seeking out doctors to prescribe the drug. But Nice director Professor Mark Baker blamed the prescribers, recommending that “soft-touch” GPs be reported and face disciplinary action.

Royal College of GPs vice-chairman Dr Tim Ballard hit back, saying family doctors prescribe antibiotics even when it is not the best course of action following “very difficult and stressful” conversations with patients.

“We need a societal change in attitudes towards the use of antibiotics and any suggestion that hard-pressed GPs — who are already trying to do their jobs in increasingly difficult circumstances — will be reported to the regulator is counterproductive and unhelpful,” he said.

“If this were to happen, we would be looking to the General Medical Council to support any GP or other health professional who finds themselves on the receiving end of complaints or criticism about decisions made over the prescribing of antibiotics.”

Research has found that nine out of 10 GPs say they feel pressured to prescribe antibiotics and nearly all patients who ask for them — 97 per cent — get them.

Nice said it was down to other bodies to translate its latest guidance into “tools that will result in real action and a change in the level of antibiotic prescribing.”