Abstract
Inappropriate antibiotic use leads to increased risk of antibiotic resistance and other adverse outcomes. The objectives of the study were to determine the prevalence and characteristics of antibiotic use in Egyptian hospitals to identify opportunities for quality improvement. A point prevalence survey was conducted in 18 hospitals in March 2011. A total of 3408 patients were included and 59% received at least one antibiotic, with the most significant use among persons <12 years and intensive care unit patients (p < 0.05). Third generation cephalosporin were the most commonly prescribed antibiotics (28.7% of prescriptions). Reasons for antibiotic use included treatment of community—(27%) and healthcare-associated infections (11%) and surgical (39%) and medical (23%) prophylaxis. Among surgical prophylaxis recipients, only 28% of evaluable cases received the first dose within two hours before incision and only 25% of cases received surgical prophylaxis for <24 h. The prevalence of antibiotic use in Egyptian hospitals was high with obvious targets for antimicrobial stewardship activities including provision of antibiotic prescription guidelines and optimization of surgical and medical prophylaxis practices.
Highlights
Excessive and inappropriate use of antibiotics is highly associated with the emergence of antibiotic resistance [1], which presents a major threat to global public health
The methodology and definitions used for the prevalence survey were adopted from those used by the European Surveillance of Antimicrobial Consumption (ESAC) Project [5]
We applied the same survey method for the assessment of the prevalence of and indications for antibiotic use as that used by the European Surveillance of Antimicrobial Consumption (ESAC) Project [5] to characterize the use of antibiotic agents in hospitals in Egypt
Summary
Excessive and inappropriate use of antibiotics is highly associated with the emergence of antibiotic resistance [1], which presents a major threat to global public health. Studies have shown that a relatively large proportion of antibiotic use is inappropriate or unnecessary [4]. The European Surveillance of Antimicrobial Consumption Survey [5] found that the prevalence of antimicrobial use among patients in 172 hospitals in 25 European countries was 29%. Identified several opportunities for improvement in antimicrobial prescribing practices [6]. The objectives of this study were to describe the prevalence and characteristics of antibiotic use in Egyptian hospitals in order to provide benchmarking data and identify targets for quality improvement
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