TY - JOUR T1 - Long term oxygen therapy (LTOT) prescription in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients in Wigan (northwest England) JF - European Respiratory Journal JO - Eur Respir J VL - 40 IS - Suppl 56 SP - P3463 AU - Sharada Gudur AU - Ayuni Zahar AU - Andrew Cross AU - Imran Aziz AU - Abdul Ashish Y1 - 2012/09/01 UR - http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/40/Suppl_56/P3463.abstract N2 - Background: LTOT has been shown to provide a survival benefit in severe COPD. In UK, since 2006, following a Royal college directive LTOT prescriptions were to be issued only by hospital specialists managing such patients after formal assessments (BTS working group report, January 2006). The directive aimed to standardise LTOT assessments, issue and follow up to hospital based practitioners and specialist services.We audited the oxygen prescriptions for adult patients in Wigan between 2006-2011 to study concordance of Royal college directives with our oxygen prescriptions.Methods: We analysed the oxygen prescription data provided by our suppliers (Air products) for the patient details and prescriber source.Results: There were 313 patients in whom oxygen was prescribed for COPD as the indication. The breakdown of prescriber source is as below.View this table:Health professionals prescribing LTOT in Wigan between 2006-11Conclusions: There are still a substantial proportion of oxygen prescriptions issued at a community level by the general practitioners and community based nurses for patients with COPD. We are unsure regarding the assessments undertaken for the adequacy of such prescriptions. This could potentially lead to harm and is likely to lead to increased cost for the healthcare services. At the current times of austerity, duplication of services should be avoided to ensure the patients and NHS gets the maximal benefit from LTOT provision. ER -