Stakeholder perspectives on electronic prescribing in primary care: a scoping review

Background Electronic prescribing (e-prescribing) provides a convenient, efficient, paperless mechanism for the legal transfer of prescriptions between service users, prescribers and dispensers. There have been advances in e-prescribing processes and increased uptake of e-prescribing globally, in recent years. Objective To explore stakeholder perspectives on e-prescribing in primary care settings. Methods A scoping review was conducted by systematically searching Medline, EMBASE, Scopus and, International Pharmaceutical Abstracts databases, using the key concepts “primary care”, “e-prescribing” and “perspectives”. Publications were selected by screening for eligibility against inclusion and exclusion criteria, whereby any publication written in English exploring e-prescribing in primary care settings from the perspective(s) of at least one type of stakeholder was eligible for inclusion. Following a systematic screening process, relevant data were extracted, collated, and synthesised. Results 2000 publications were identified and systematically screened, rendering 44 publications (e.g. primary research articles, abstracts) eligible for inclusion in this review. Most publications reported on studies conducted in the USA, the UK and Europe and explored the views of pharmacists, pharmacy technicians and pharmacy staff. Barriers to e-prescribing included system design and technical issues, lack of adequate training and communication issues between stakeholders. Enablers for e-prescribing included time savings, convenience, and increased legibility of prescriptions. Conclusions This review highlights many benefits of e-prescribing such as time efficiency, convenience, increased legibility, and less mishandling. Despite this, key barriers to e-prescribing within primary care settings were also recognised, including system design, technical issues, and lack of adequate training. As such, forcing functions, prescription tracking technologies, and better training have been identified as potential ways to address these barriers. While some negative experiences were reported, stakeholders were generally satisfied and had positive experiences with e-prescribing.