Professor Colum Dunne:

Largely, yes. One should bear in mind, however, that our work is based on a qualitative study so a very large number of GPs have not been surveyed. If one were to carry out a larger study throughout the country using a body such as the ICGP, one would get very valuable information on GPs' prescribing patterns. "Rational prescribing", as it is termed, is an area of significant research, but it is not included in the work that we did.