Tag Archives: AMS
ACIPC presentation – VRE control update Nov 2021
How can we control VRE? Ferguson ACIPC 2021 Invited presentation to ACIPC Conference – the top 3 horizontal (standard) controls are: Hand hygiene by healthcare staff Environmental controls – REACH trial Antimicrobial stewardship – target piperacillin+tazobactam and ceftriaxone to reduce usage below 30 DDD/1000 patient-days. References https://www.mja.com.au/journal/2019/211/3/reduced-vre-and-mrsa-colonisation-and-infection-following-sustained-reduction Ferguson- VRE in hospitals – 2014 monograph https://www.publish.csiro.au/ma/MA14011 […]
Be Medicinewise Week – Take Charge!
This year during Be Medicinewise week the National Prescribing Service (NPS) is encouraging clinicians to promote Australians taking charge of their health by being medicinewise, and raising awareness on the importance of having conversations about medicines. Be Medicinewise week (last week!) suggested clinicians ask patients to keep in mind 3 key pieces of advice to take control […]
AIMED- dedicated to better use of antibiotics
AIMED stands for five essential principles that seek to optimise patient treatment with antimicrobials (antibiotics). Antimicrobial stewardship 101 – excellent overview from McKenzie, Rawlins and Del Mar in Australian Prescriber.
New CDC resources for antimicrobial stewardship in residential aged care
Antimicrobial stewardship is as important in nursing homes or any residential aged care facility as a hospital. A recent study of MRSA epidemiology in the Hunter New England region indicates a significant association between residential aged care residence and first detection of MRSA in the community associated group with no contact with healthcare over previous […]
What are cumulative antibiograms ?
Antibiograms summarise local antimicrobial susceptibility in order to guide appropriate antimicrobial prescribing. Ideally they are updated annually by microbiology services to provide a current picture of bacterial susceptibility and the local incidence of key sentinel resistant pathogens.
CEC 5×5 antimicrobial audit launched today
The 5×5 Antimicrobial Audit is a sustainable model of audit, intervention and feedback designed to improve the quality of antimicrobial prescribing in targeted areas of clinical practice. The methodology of the 5×5 Antimicrobial Audit involves ongoing data collection of small sample sizes, with trained auditors required to answer up to 5 questions in 5 or […]
NICE NEW Antimicrobial Stewardship Guidelines
The UK now has national guidelines regarding antimicrobial stewardship, just like the USA and Australia. The guidelines recommend antimicrobial stewardship activities across all aspects of health care and encourage research into new antibiotics. The guideline also provides useful advice on how to deal with patients who inappropriately request antibiotics – see below for some excerpts-
Australia releases first National Strategy to address Antimicrobial Resistance
This week Health Minister, Susan Ley and Agriculture Minister, Barnaby Joyce released a statement regarding the publication of Australia’s first national strategy to address antimicrobial resistance. The strategy covers the next 4 years and aims to reduce Australia’s antimicrobial use to combat resistance. It is based on the WHO Global Action Plan for AMR. The […]
How long should we treat Intra-abdominal Infections for? RCT evidence
A recent randomised trial has shown that patients who receive fixed duration antibiotic therapy (approximately 4 days) had similar outcomes to patients who received longer courses (approximately 8 days). 518 patients with complicated intra-abdominal infections were recruited. Patients received either a fixed course of antibiotics or antibiotics until 2 days after the resolution of fever, leucocytosis […]
Delaying antibiotic prescribing strategies
There are several strategies than can be used when doctors are reluctant to issue antibiotic prescriptions. You can ask patients to get back in touch is they don’t improve, post-date prescriptions, ask patients to come back and collect the prescription if they aren’t feeling better, write the prescription and ask the patient to delay using […]
AIMED - Let's talk about antibiotics 