[Quality of medical order writing in general practice facilities (Sousse, Tunisia)].

Background: A medical order is a medical and legal document; careful writing of this document enables the reduction of many therapeutic errors.

Objective: The objective of this study was to evaluate the quality of order writing in Tunisian primary healthcare centres.

Methods: This was a transversal descriptive survey of 2586 medical orders. The quality of the writing was assessed using two parameters: its legibility and the information delivered in it.

Results: Among the main results, 36% of orders contained at least 50% of the items retained, 25% of orders were completely illegible, and the quality of writing was considered good in 14% of cases.

Discussion: The study showed that hand-written orders in primary healthcare are far from complying with the medico-legal requirements. The teaching of order-writing technique and its computerisation are needed to improve the quality of medical prescribing.