ABSTRACT
During an 18-week period in 1978-1979, a weekly bulletin containing information about patients' stay in hospital and prescribing patterns in each unit was distributed to all doctors and senior nurses of six general medical and six general surgical units in the Royal Adelaide Hospital. For the first nine weeks, the bulletins contained information from half of the units, then crossed over in the second nine-week period. The mean stay in all units of 2251 persons discharged from hospital during the first nine weeks was 9.5 days, compared with 8.7 days for the 2234 patients in the second nine weeks (a reduction of more than 2000 bed-days (P less than 0.002)). The percentage of outpatients and discharged inpatients who were given prescriptions for more than two drugs fell from 15.3% to 13% (P less than 0.001). It is likely that publication of the bulletins influenced discharge and prescribing decisions by increasing general awareness that these matters were under review.
