Audit and feedback interventions elicit behaviour change by describing existing patterns of behaviour and providing education about desired ideal behaviours. But these effects vary based on their design and delivery.
Although many studies showed the effectiveness of such interventions on clinician prescribing behaviours, few have looked at the prescriber and practice characteristics most predictive of behaviour changes.
Understanding which clinicians are most likely to respond positively is necessary for improving quality of care. How was this review done?Listen to this blog at the DopeCloud podcast:
We wanted to find all studies in the literature to answer our research question: Which primary care physician and practice characteristics are associated with the largest changes in prescribing behaviours following audit and feedback interventions?
The studies had to:
– recruit primary care physicians who had undertaken a practice audit with a subsequent feedback session;
– be published in academic journals which were included in MEDLINE and EMBASE;
– be published between January 2010 and July 2021.
What does the evidence say about audit and feedback?
Only five studies met our criteria: three looked at prescribing patterns and two examined how physicians engaged with the interventions.
Two studies (Chang, et al. 2018, and Soylu, et al. 2021) suggest that physician engagement and leadership engagement are associated with generally larger responses to audit and feedback interventions. An engaged leadership group can positively change the response to these interventions.
Who changes the most?
There aren’t many well-designed studies and it’s difficult to determine the role of physician and practice features. Quasi-experimental studies should be prioritised to understand whether physician and practice features can be helpful to improve audit and feedback interventions.
Ref: Paulovic, J., Hamilton, M., McCracken, R., Klimas, J. (2022) Primary care physician and practice characteristics in audit and feedback interventions: A scoping Review. Poster presented at the virtual National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) International Forum | June 10.Article first published on LinkedInIf you’re interested in reading more about medical education, see also articles here