Drug interaction alerts in software--what do general practitioners and pharmacists want?

To explore Australian general practitioners' and pharmacists' preferences in relation to content, format and usability of drug interaction alerts in prescribing and dispensing software.

Surveys that sought opinions on drug interaction decision support were mailed to a random sample of GPs and community pharmacists (1000 of each) in June 2010.

Usefulness of various components of drug interaction information; preferred format of drug interaction alerts; levels of agreement on the value of various usability features; aspects of drug interaction decision support users would most like to change.

Surveys were returned by 219 GPs and 170 pharmacists. Of the 191 GPs and 138 pharmacists included in the analysis, the vast majority considered severity, clinical effects and management advice to be mostly or sometimes useful in drug interaction alerts. The most popular drug interaction alert format--favoured by 131 GPs (69%) and 115 pharmacists (83%)--was one with headings and one or two succinct bullet points under each. The vast majority of respondents also wanted to be able to differentiate drug interaction alerts by severity, and a majority agreed that it should be made more difficult to override alerts for severe interactions and that it should be mandatory to provide a reason for doing so.

GPs and pharmacists want drug interaction alert information to be relevant, useful, concise, and easy to read and comprehend. Software vendors and knowledge providers could improve drug interaction decision support by making changes to the content and format of drug interaction alerts according to our recommendations.