ON TARGET FOR ANTIBIOTIC PRESCRIBING
T
he TARGET Antibiotics toolkit (the acronym stands for Treat Antibiotics Responsibly, Guidance, Education, Tools), developed with the UK Health Security Agency, brings together a huge range of resources for primary care teams. Professor Cliodna McNulty, former head of the Primary Care Unit at Public Health England and RCGP programme lead for TARGET Antibiotics, oversaw the launch of the first toolkit in 2012. “We’ve gone onwards and upwards since then,” says Professor McNulty. “Public Health England continues to support the TARGET project, and each year we improve the toolkit.” The TARGET toolkit includes a series of training resources such as clinical scenario slides, webinars, eLearning modules, pod-
COLLEGE LAUNCHES NEW MENTORING PLATFORM The new RCGP Mentoring platform has been running since Spring 2021. It's a peer-led development tool designed to support members’ career growth and progress by matching GP mentors with mentees based on similar attributes, mutual interests, skills, expertise, and locality. Resources on the platform include; bi-annual learning events, and monthly information digests. Mentees are benefiting from one-to-one support and productive discussions about career successes and challenges, advice on how to develop strengths and overcome weaknesses at work, and guidance on opportunities for professional development and advancement. One mentee using the platform is Dr Oluwatoyin Oyelakin-Elusode, a newly qualified GP, practising in the West Midlands, and part of the South East Thames Faculty, said:
casts and quizzes, covering UTIs, respiratory tract infections and other conditions for which antibiotic prescribing is often considered. Diagnostic flowcharts and patient-facing leaflets, including pictorial materials, can later be used to assist in consultations where communication may be challenging. “Practices can also take a deep dive into individuals’ prescribing behaviour – which isn’t shown in practice-level data – using the audit tools,” she explains. All materials are underpinned by behavioural theory and developed using a GP– and patient-centred approach. A randomised controlled trial showed a 4% decrease in overall prescribing in areas where the TARGET toolkit was implemented.
“For me, the mentoring scheme was my leverage to get my passion back. The fatigue of training and juggling family responsibilities, and the increasing demand on GPs with overstretched resource had subtly eroded my passion for general practice. I enjoy medicine, but realised I needed someone to help me see how I could carve a career in the overwhelming circumstances of current general practice. Luckily, my GP mentor is also a trained coach and licensed in lifestyle medicine. The mutual respect, understanding and structure to the meetings is great. Using the smart goal approach, I discussed my strengths and areas of weakness and how to optimise and overcome these. Simply having someone validating your experience and steering you forward with your strengths in mind is invaluable. I highly recommend the RCGP mentoring scheme to everyone. There's a plethora of mentors with varied experiences to glean from. I get the feeling I'll become a mentor too – out of sheer gratitude.” Mentors have also been able to develop skills in personal leadership and coaching styles and expand their professional networks.
“We find that GPs prescribe for up to three reasons,” says Professor McNulty. “Patients perceive that antibiotics make a difference to the length of their illness; GPs want to prevent complications, particularly sepsis; and there is a high level of patient demand. “The toolkit highlights the minimal difference that antibiotics make to the length of an illness. Resources also describe the complication rate, to reassure GPs that it’s very low. They support GPs with safety netting, as it’s important to reduce sepsis, and also with encouraging patient selfcare and prevention of future illnesses sign off," she said. Access the toolkit here
GP mentee
GPs are leading the way in the effort to tackle growing global antimicrobial resistance with prescriptions for antibiotics falling by 13% in general practice between 2012–2016 – and the College is supporting them in this vital work.
“I have found the Mentoring platform easy to use, and very helpful,” said mentor Amanda Robinson. “I found my mentee interesting and they just needed me to be supportive and to encourage them to persevere with the plan they had already set out. Thank you to the RCGP for the usefulness of this platform. It provides an easy way for me to be supportive even though I have now retired.” More information about how to register as an RCGP mentor or mentee is available here.
WELCOME NEWS
| 13
