engleski

Use of Quality Indicators for Antibiotic Prescribing

The quality of drug prescribing, including antimicrobials, has been measured through indicators which are defined as measurable elements of practice performance for which there is evidence or consensus that they can be used to assess quality. Antimicrobial prescribing quality can be assessed by process and outcome indicators where the process indicators measure the quality of processes in health care and outcome indicators measure the results achieved. Appropriate antimicrobial prescribing is defined as the optimal selection, dosage and duration of antimicrobial treatment that results in the best clinical outcome for the treatment or prevention of infection, with minimal toxicity to the patient and minimal impact on subsequent resistance. Examples of process indicators that evaluate the quality of antimicrobial drug use include prevalence studies on their use, benchmarking studies, adherence to guidelines, choice of drugs for specific conditions, use of combination of antimicrobials etc. with regard to selection, dosage and duration of antimicrobial use. Defining and standardization of outcome measures is difficult because antimicrobial prescribed to one patient eventually affects the whole population. Outcome measures can roughly be categorized as patient outcomes (for instance readmission rates, infection-related mortality, etc), resistance outcomes (for instance reduction of resistance rates, reduction of certain nosocomial infections, etc.) and cost outcomes (for instance reduction in overall antimicrobial expenditures). An overview of the indicators used for evaluation of the quality of antimicrobial prescribing will be given.

prescribing; quality indicators; antibiotics

nije evidentirano