• Polypharmacy
• Primary Health Care
• Therapeutics
• Evidence-Based Medicine

The number of blood tests being carried out in primary care to monitor drugs and diseases is growing fast and likely to increase further in the coming years as patient care is moved from outpatients into the community. A recent study suggests that of the 50 million blood tests undertaken in general practice each year, 40% are for monitoring purposes alone.1 2 It has been estimated that at the beginning of the 21st century a patient might have expected one blood test each year, yet by 2015, this had burgeoned to five tests each year.3

There are a number of reasons for this. The development of national guidelines, such as those produced by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), has resulted in the adoption of clinical pathways that require monitoring of drug …