Over Medication and Waste of Resources in Physicians’ Prescriptions: A Cross Sectional Study in Southwestern Iran

Background: In the health services, financial resources are limited. An important way to save and prevent resources from going to waste is to use clinical guidelines. Objectives: The objective of this study was to estimate the wasted cost as a result of ignoring clinical guidelines for a typical disease. Methods: This cross-sectional study was performed in Fars province. 392 physicians were enrolled in this study and were asked to write a prescription for a hypothetical patient with streptococcal sore throat. Prescriptions were priced and compared to standard treatment costs and analyzed by SPSS software. Results: Mean, median and mode of prescribed drugs in each prescription was 3.1, 3.0 and 3.0, respectively. Only 8.4% of the prescriptions were in accordance with the clinical guidelines, and 12% had led to mistreatment. Usually, physicians with more experience prescribed more expensive medications, and 45.5% of the total medication cost had gone to waste. About 5% of household drugs are waste. Due to mistreatment, 2 patients developed acute rheumatic fever. Conclusions: Waste of recourses and patients out of pocket payment was high, which reduces patient’s ability for obtain other necessary healthcare services. Hence, training the physicians and developing clinical guidelines is an urgent necessity to prevent resources from being wasted.