To kick off Antibiotic Awareness week, here are some favourite postings that you may wish to (re)visit:

[BTW, thank you to many who have provided us with constructive ideas and overwhelming positive feedback – please do complete our short survey if you’d like to tell us something!]

This posting from pharmacist, Kate O’Hara laid out important ANTIBIOTIC RESISTANCE: FACTS AND FIGURES . What about the Australian situation? Look to the excellent AURA 2016 report.

AUSTRALIAN ANTIMICROBIAL USE & RESISTANCE- KEY FINDINGS. Also the just released comprehensive, one health-oriented Australian AMR implementation plan.

IS IT REALLY CELLULITIS? – DIFFERENTIAL DIAGNOSIS OF A RED LEG (March 2015) – remains one of our most read items. Try the skin/soft tissue category for more wisdom!

FLUCLOXACILLIN IS HIGHLY EFFECTIVE AGAINST STREPTOCOCCUS PYOGENES (GROUP A STREP) AND RELATED SPECIES (Jan 2015) – we returned to this topic to unpack a few more misconceptions this year in July with: EXTRAPOLATING ANTIBIOTIC SUSCEPTIBILITY FOR STREPTOCOCCI INCLUDING THE PNEUMOCOCCUS.

Microbiology report comments unpacked are postings that focus on a range of key comments that labs can use to provide mainstream infection management advice- as an example, see MICRO COMMENTS UNPACKED: GRAM NEGATIVE BACTERAEMIA.

WASTED SPECTRUM 101 – AMOXICILLIN+CLAVULANATE OVERUSE seemed to touch a chord providing examples of situations where use of this agent is unnecessary and also unpacking the differential susceptibility of different type of bacteria to amoxycillin versus amox+clav.

A valued guest author Dr Patrick Harris penned this timely review based on extensive work that he has contributed to: SPARING MEROPENEM 101 – TREATMENT OF ESCPM SPECIES AND AMPC BETALACTAMASES UNPACKED (Feb 2016). He returned in April with this further posting on a similar Gram negative bacterial resistance theme: SPARING MEROPENEM 101: WHAT ALTERNATIVES EXIST FOR THE TREATMENT OF ESBL-PRODUCERS?

Our resident pharmacologist, Prof. Ian Whyte unpacked ANTIBIOTICS AND THE QT INTERVAL (Jan 2016) following on from our topical analysis of RELATIVE MORTALITY RISK FROM ANTIBIOTIC USE COMPARED in Dec 2015.

Quinolones (e.g. ciprofloxacin ) were a particular focus – see this search for some example postings including this popular one: SPARING FLUOROQUINOLONES – ALTERNATIVE SAFE AND EFFECTIVE OPTIONS BY SYNDROME AND BUG.