The role of general practitioners and pharmacists in information exchange with family carers

As a trial of the provision of community-service information to family carers, general practitioners and pharmacists from the Western region of Melbourne were supplied with tear-off pads listing suburb-specific community services, and were encouraged to discuss service needs with carers of people with disabilities and distribute the lists to carers accordingly. One hundred and nine general practitioners and 58 pharmacists participated in pretrial and post-trial interviews assessing their knowledge of community services and frequency of discussion with carers. Before the trial, general practitioners had significantly higher self-rated knowledge of community services and reportedly discussed these with carers more often than did pharmacists. After the five-month trial period, pharmacists showed a significant increase in self-rated knowledge and frequency of discussion. General practitioners' knowledge and discussion showed a nonsignificant increase. After the trial, the two did not differ in knowledge of services; however, general practitioners maintained a higher reported frequency of discussion about services with carers. General practitioners and pharmacists appear to be well placed to act as a service link for family carers. However, additional high-intensity strategies are needed to assist them in this role.