Introduction / objectives Resistant bacteria pose more and more a risk to patient safety in Europe, especially in cross-border regions where differences in antibiotics prescription and hygiene policies exist. Antibiotic Stewardship Programs (ASPs) have been implemented in some hospitals to facilitate healthcare professionals in adequately prescribing antibiotics to improve patient safety and to...

Antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) has been touted as one of the key strategies required in tackling worldwide escalation of antibiotic resistance. Although AMS has optimized antibiotic usage and reduced the incidence of resistance development in some regions, its full global potential has been curtailed by various AMS-impeding factors. This article seeks to highlight in a detailed perspective, th...

We continue to be warned about the risk of antibiotic resistance. This campaign has targeted medicine and agriculture, asking these industries to pay attention to the risks of widespread resistance and to cut the use of antibiotics wherever possible. However, there has been little to no mention of the widespread use of antibiotics in the scientific research community. As scientists we use antib...

Every day, critical care physicians around the world face the same challenge of the optimal timing of antimicrobial administration: when to start and when to stop antibiotics. Duration of antibiotic therapy for sepsis is mostly based on expert opinion, but its reduction is arguably the most promising approach to decrease emergence and selection of antibiotic resistance. The study by Hochreiter ...

OBJECTIVES To assess the impact of an infection team review of patients receiving antibiotics in six hospitals across the UK and to establish the suitability of these patients for continued care in the community. METHODS An evaluation audit tool was used to assess all patients on antibiotic treatment on acute wards on a given day. Clinical and antibiotic use data were collected by an infectio...

The need to use front-line antibiotics wisely has never been greater. Antibiotic resistance and multi-drug resistant infection, driven by antibiotic use, remain major public health and professional concerns. To overcome these infection problems, use of older antibiotics active against multidrug-resistant pathogens is increasing – for example, colistin, fosfomycin, pivmecillinam, pristinamycin, ...

This decade will see the emergence of the electronic medical record, electronic prescribing and computerized decision support in the hospital setting. Current opinion from key infectious diseases bodies supports the use of computerized decision support systems as potentially useful tools in antibiotic stewardship programs. However, although antibiotic decision support systems appear beneficial ...

Several controlled clinical studies have evaluated the potential of the infection biomarker procalcitonin (PCT) to improve the diagnostic work-up of patients with bacterial infections and its influence on decisions regarding antibiotic therapy. Most research has focused on lower respiratory tract infections and critically ill sepsis patients. A clinical utility for PCT has also been found for p...

This observational, cross-sectional study describes the role played by clinical microbiology and pharmacy departments in the stewardship of antibiotic prescribing in European hospitals. A total of 170 acute care hospitals from 32 European countries returned a questionnaire on antibiotic policies and practices implemented in 2001. Data on antibiotic use, expressed as Defined Daily Doses per 100 ...