Background
Acne vulgaris can have a substantial impact on a patient’s quality of life; there can be
significant psychosocial consequences and it can leave permanent physical scarring.
Early and effective acne treatment is important.
Objective
To describe the outcome of an accredited clinical audit investigating general
practitioner management of acne vulgaris and to provide an outline of current ‘best
practice’ acne management.
Discussion
The audit was conducted over two cycles with GPs receiving educational material
between cycles. Eighty-five GPs contributed data on 1638 patients. General practitioner
management of acne was assessed against a set of preset standards and some acne
treatment was found to be inconsistent with best practice, particularly for patients
with moderate and moderate to severe acne, where many patients were either being
undertreated or treatment with antibiotic therapy was suboptimal. It is likely that
this treatment gap is overestimated due to practical limitations of the audit process;
however, the audit revealed a need to address the main sources of apparent divergence
from best practice to improve the quality use of acne therapies.
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