The nature of cancer control is changing, with an increasing emphasis, fuelled by public and political demand, on prevention, early diagnosis, and patient experience during and after treatment. At the same time, primary care is increasingly promoted, by governments and health funders worldwide, as the preferred setting for most health care for reasons of increasing need, to stabilise health-care costs, and to accommodate patient preference for care close to home. It is timely, then, to consider how this expanding role for primary care can work for cancer control, which has long been dominated by highly technical interventions centred on treatment, and in which the contribution of primary care has been largely perceived as marginal. In this Commission, expert opinion from primary care and public health professionals with academic and clinical cancer expertise-from epidemiologists, psychologists, policy makers, and cancer specialists-has contributed to a detailed consideration of the evidence for cancer control provided in primary care and community care settings. Ranging from primary prevention to end-of-life care, the scope for new models of care is explored, and the actions needed to eff ect change are outlined. The strengths of primary care-its continuous, coordinated, and comprehensive care for individuals and families-are particularly evident in prevention and diagnosis, in shared follow-up and survivorship care, and in end-of-life care. A strong theme of integration of care runs throughout, and its elements (clinical, vertical, and functional) and the tools needed for integrated working are described in detail. All of this change, as it evolves, will need to be underpinned by new research and by continuing and shared multiprofessional development.

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Inappropriate prescribing of medicines may lead to a significant risk of an adverse drug-related event. In particular, prescribing may be regarded as inappropriate when alternative therapy that is either more effective or associated with a lower risk exists to treat the same condition. This review aims to identify interventions and strategies that can significantly reduce inappropriate prescribing in the elderly. The review is based on a search of electronic databases using synonyms of keywords such as 'elderly', 'interventions', 'optimized prescribing' and 'inappropriate prescribing' to identify reported interventions intended to improve inappropriate prescribing in the elderly. A total of 711 articles published in English were retrieved and considered. Of these, 24 original studies, involving 56 to 124,802 participants, met the inclusion criteria and were included in the systematic review. In 16 studies, the statistical power used to assess the impact of the intervention was >90% at a significance level of alpha=0.05. Various interventions were included in this study, such as educational interventions, medication reviews, geriatricians' services, multidisciplinary teams, computerized support systems, regulatory policies and multi-faceted approaches. Because of variability in assessment methodologies, mixed responses were found for education interventions aimed at improving inappropriate prescribing. For example, some studies did not assess what data were required to define whether a given level of intervention would be adequate, and others did not consider how many participants would be needed to demonstrate that a significant difference existed. Each of the three computerized support system interventions reported produced a significant enhancement in both prescribing and dispensing practices. Pharmacist interventions in community and hospital settings were evaluated in seven studies. However, variable criteria were used, with two studies using the Medication Appropriateness Index, another two studies using self-designed criteria for inappropriate prescribing, and the remaining three studies using Beers' criteria. A difficulty in assessing studies involving nursing home residents is that both consultant pharmacists and onsite pharmacist services may be involved, and, in one of the studies, only the role of the consultant pharmacist was considered. One of the most effective interventions appeared to be multidisciplinary case conferences involving a geriatrician, which resulted in a number of examples of reduced inappropriate prescribing in both community and hospital settings. As the effect of regulatory policies as an intervention is dependent on the target population involved, the effectiveness of this type of intervention was variable. Different strategies may be useful in reducing inappropriate prescribing in the elderly. It is not clear whether combined strategies undertaken simultaneously have a synergistic effect.

BackgroundThe need to improve doctors' access to health care by reducing the barriers they experience has been regularly described in the literature, yet the barriers experienced are not well defined, despite the volume of expert opinion in this area. AimTo define what is known about doctors' access to health care from the data within the current literature. Design of studyA systematic review of studies of doctors' health access. MethodA systematic search of MEDLINE ® and CINAHL, supplemented by citation searches and searches of the grey literature, identified both quantitative and qualitative studies. Two reviewers used specific criteria for inclusion of studies and quality assessment. The data were tabulated and analysed. ResultsTwenty-six articles met the inclusion criteria. The paucity of data and the overall poor quality of those data are highlighted. Despite this, many doctors appear to have a GP, but this does not ensure adequate health access. Systemic barriers to healthcare access (long hours and cultural issues) are more significant than individual barriers. ConclusionExpert opinion in this field is supported by poor-quality data. The current knowledge reveals important similarities between doctors and the general population in their healthcare access, especially with mental health issues. Understanding this may help the medical profession to respond to these issues of 'doctors' health' more effectively. Keywordsattitude of health personnel; health behaviour; physician health; systematic review.

General practitioners (GPs) deliver the majority of palliative care to patients in the last year of life. This article seeks to examine the nature of GP care, perceptions of the GPs themselves and others of that care, the adequacy of palliative care training, issues relating to accessibility of GPs to palliative care patients, and strategies that may be of use in encouraging more effective delivery of palliative care by GPs. Medline and PubMed databases from 1966 to 2000 were searched, and 135 references identified. Sixty-six of these described studies relevant to GP palliative care. GPs value this part of their work. Most of the time, patients appreciate the contribution the GP makes to palliative care particularly if the GP is accessible, takes time to listen, allows patient and carer to ventilate their feelings, and is seen to be making efforts made regarding symptom relief. However, reports from bereaved relatives suggest that palliative care is performed less well in the community than in other settings. GPs express discomfort about their competence to perform palliative care adequately. They tend to miss symptoms which are not treatable by them, or which are less common. However, with appropriate specialist support and facilities, GPs have been shown to deliver sound and effective care. GP comfort working with specialist teams increases with exposure to this form of patient management, as does the understanding of the potential other team members have in contributing to the care of the patient. Formal arrangements engaging GPs to work with specialist teams have been shown to improve functional outcomes, patient satisfaction, improve effective use of resources and improve effective physician behaviour in other areas of medicine. Efforts by specialist services to develop formal involvement of GPs in the care of individual patients, may be an effective method of improving GP palliative care skills and appreciation of the roles specialist services can play.