Older patients with suspected UTIs should be given antibiotics immediately, say UK researchers.

Their large study shows rates of sepsis are more than 10 times higher among over-65-year-olds given no antibiotics or a deferred script by their GP than for those prescribed the drugs straight away.

The findings go against increasing pressure on GPs to reduce unnecessary antibiotic use, note the authors, from a range of London universities.

In the study, which included nearly 313,000 incidences of UTI in more than 157,000 primary care patients, the overall rate of sepsis was low, at 0.5% in the 60 days post-UTI diagnosis.