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Evaluation of antibiotic prescription in the Lebanese community: a pilot study

BACKGROUND: Antibiotics are considered among the most commonly prescribed drug classes in developing countries. Inappropriate prescription of antibiotics is a major public health concern and is related to the development of antimicrobial resistance. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed at assessing the appro...

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Autores principales: Saleh, Nadine, Awada, Sanaa, Awwad, Rana, Jibai, Sahar, Arfoul, Chadi, Zaiter, Liliana, Dib, Wissam, Salameh, Pascale
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Co-Action Publishing 2015
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4481048/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26112266
http://dx.doi.org/10.3402/iee.v5.27094
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author Saleh, Nadine
Awada, Sanaa
Awwad, Rana
Jibai, Sahar
Arfoul, Chadi
Zaiter, Liliana
Dib, Wissam
Salameh, Pascale
author_facet Saleh, Nadine
Awada, Sanaa
Awwad, Rana
Jibai, Sahar
Arfoul, Chadi
Zaiter, Liliana
Dib, Wissam
Salameh, Pascale
author_sort Saleh, Nadine
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Antibiotics are considered among the most commonly prescribed drug classes in developing countries. Inappropriate prescription of antibiotics is a major public health concern and is related to the development of antimicrobial resistance. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed at assessing the appropriateness of antibiotic prescription by non-infectious disease physicians in a community setting in Lebanon. METHODS: A pilot cross-sectional study was undertaken on community pharmacy patients presenting with antibiotic prescription. It was performed over a period of 4 months in different regions of Lebanon. Participants answered a questionnaire inquiring about socio-demographic characteristics, medical conditions, symptoms that required medical attention, the doctor's diagnosis, the prescribed antibiotic, and whether laboratory tests were ordered to identify the causative organism or not. Data were analyzed using SPSS 17. RESULTS: We studied 270 patients (49.3% males and 50.7% females). This study showed that the most-prescribed antibiotics were the cephalosporins (82%) and that almost half of the illnesses for which antibiotics were prescribed were respiratory tract infections (41%). The study also showed that the choice of the prescribed antibiotic was appropriate in 61.5% of the studied cases, while the prescribed dose and the duration of the treatment were inaccurate in 52 and 64% of the cases, respectively. In addition, fever seemed to be a factor that influenced the physician's prescriptions, since the choice of drug conformity to guidelines increased from 53.7% (1 day of fever) to 88.9% (1 week of fever), and the dose prescription compliance to guidelines was higher (55.9%) for patients suffering from fever compared to those with no fever (38.1%). CONCLUSION: This study showed a high prevalence of inappropriate antibiotic prescriptions in Lebanon. Therefore, actions should be taken to optimize antibiotic prescription.
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spelling pubmed-44810482015-07-28 Evaluation of antibiotic prescription in the Lebanese community: a pilot study Saleh, Nadine Awada, Sanaa Awwad, Rana Jibai, Sahar Arfoul, Chadi Zaiter, Liliana Dib, Wissam Salameh, Pascale Infect Ecol Epidemiol Original Research Article BACKGROUND: Antibiotics are considered among the most commonly prescribed drug classes in developing countries. Inappropriate prescription of antibiotics is a major public health concern and is related to the development of antimicrobial resistance. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed at assessing the appropriateness of antibiotic prescription by non-infectious disease physicians in a community setting in Lebanon. METHODS: A pilot cross-sectional study was undertaken on community pharmacy patients presenting with antibiotic prescription. It was performed over a period of 4 months in different regions of Lebanon. Participants answered a questionnaire inquiring about socio-demographic characteristics, medical conditions, symptoms that required medical attention, the doctor's diagnosis, the prescribed antibiotic, and whether laboratory tests were ordered to identify the causative organism or not. Data were analyzed using SPSS 17. RESULTS: We studied 270 patients (49.3% males and 50.7% females). This study showed that the most-prescribed antibiotics were the cephalosporins (82%) and that almost half of the illnesses for which antibiotics were prescribed were respiratory tract infections (41%). The study also showed that the choice of the prescribed antibiotic was appropriate in 61.5% of the studied cases, while the prescribed dose and the duration of the treatment were inaccurate in 52 and 64% of the cases, respectively. In addition, fever seemed to be a factor that influenced the physician's prescriptions, since the choice of drug conformity to guidelines increased from 53.7% (1 day of fever) to 88.9% (1 week of fever), and the dose prescription compliance to guidelines was higher (55.9%) for patients suffering from fever compared to those with no fever (38.1%). CONCLUSION: This study showed a high prevalence of inappropriate antibiotic prescriptions in Lebanon. Therefore, actions should be taken to optimize antibiotic prescription. Co-Action Publishing 2015-06-24 /pmc/articles/PMC4481048/ /pubmed/26112266 http://dx.doi.org/10.3402/iee.v5.27094 Text en © 2015 Nadine Saleh et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License, permitting all non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Original Research Article
Saleh, Nadine
Awada, Sanaa
Awwad, Rana
Jibai, Sahar
Arfoul, Chadi
Zaiter, Liliana
Dib, Wissam
Salameh, Pascale
Evaluation of antibiotic prescription in the Lebanese community: a pilot study
title Evaluation of antibiotic prescription in the Lebanese community: a pilot study
title_full Evaluation of antibiotic prescription in the Lebanese community: a pilot study
title_fullStr Evaluation of antibiotic prescription in the Lebanese community: a pilot study
title_full_unstemmed Evaluation of antibiotic prescription in the Lebanese community: a pilot study
title_short Evaluation of antibiotic prescription in the Lebanese community: a pilot study
title_sort evaluation of antibiotic prescription in the lebanese community: a pilot study
topic Original Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4481048/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26112266
http://dx.doi.org/10.3402/iee.v5.27094
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