Medication

Webinar: Antidepressants in primary care

WEBINAR: Associate Professor David Menkes and Professor Bruce Arroll discussed the evidence for the benefit for antidepressants in primary care, as well as cases to support key points.

Clozapine. Malignant constipation can kill

Clozapine is used for treatment-resistant schizophrenia. Agranulocytosis and neutropenia are the usual concerns but there are more deaths from ileus/megacolon.

Webinar: Prescribing antipsychotics in primary care

Webinar with Associate Professor David Menkes. David is an academic psychiatrist with a background in psychology and pharmacology (PhD 1983, Yale), and a continuing interest in the optimal use and toxicology of drug treatments in psychiatry.

Webinar: Statins; who, when, where and why

In this webinar Dr Tony Scott, cardiologist talked about the use of statins in primary care and dealt with questions such as 'are all statins equal?' and 'how do you prescribe statins and maintain medication compliance?" 

Also covered was how to approach discussions around the size of the benefit to enable patients to be fully informed (re taking statins) and how to discuss potential harms eg., dementia, diabetes, fatigue and muscle aches.

 

Beta-blockers no longer first line for simple hypertension

Initiating treatment of hypertension with beta-blockers leads to modest CVD reductions and little or no effects on mortality (atenolol mainly studied).

Responsible opioid prescribing

Dr Helen Fulcher, Goodfellow GP Advisor talks with Northland General Practitioner and Addiction Medicine Specialist Dr Alistair Dunn about opioids in the context of pain management in the non-palliative setting.

Topics covered include:

Minimising harm in opioid drug prescribing

Prescribing opioid medications can be problematic due to potential for dependence and misuse. Therefore, care must be taken to prescribe safely and appropriately to minimise associated harms.

Opioid medications that may be prescribed in general practice include morphine, fentanyl, methadone, oxycodone, tramadol, codeine and dihydrocodeine.

Opioid analgesic overuse and dependence is a growing problem in Australasia and internationally. Opioid dependence tends to be a chronic relapsing disorder with significant associated morbidity and mortality.

Medication update

Professor Bruce Arroll discusses updates in New Zealand medication for general practice. Bruce is a GP in South Auckland, director of the Goodfellow Unit and a Professor in General Practice at the University of Auckland.

HIV PrEP: Ongoing management

This MedCase considers how to renew prescriptions for patients already taking HIV PrEP, with a discussion of current issues for GPs to consider.

Managing DVT with Rivaroxaban

MEDCASE: Rivaroxaban for treatment of deep vein thrombosis

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