Increasing patient choice in primary care: the management of minor ailments.

We examine the effects of an intervention to provide easier access to pharmacists for patients with minor ailments. The intervention allowed pharmacists to prescribe and dispense medicines currently limited to general practitioners (GPs) without patients losing their right to free prescriptions. We show that the total number of GP consultations was unaffected by the intervention but that the proportion which were for minor ailments decreased. We also use estimate multinomial models of patient choices between GP and pharmacies and find that the main determinant is the type of minor ailment. Distance appears to have no effect on patient choice.