Cargando…

Low Request of Antibiotics from Patients with Respiratory Tract Infections in Six Countries: Results from the Happy Audit Study

A total of 59,535 patients with respiratory tract infections were registered in the Happy Audit project, an audit-based, before-and-after study conducted in primary care centres of six countries (Argentina, Denmark, Lithuania, Russia, Spain, and Sweden) in 2008 and 2009. An antibiotic was explicitly...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Llor, Carl, Bjerrum, Lars, Strandberg, Eva Lena, Radzeviciene, Ruta, Reutskiy, Anatoliy, Caballero, Lidia
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4790264/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27029315
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics2040477
_version_ 1782420962890743808
author Llor, Carl
Bjerrum, Lars
Strandberg, Eva Lena
Radzeviciene, Ruta
Reutskiy, Anatoliy
Caballero, Lidia
author_facet Llor, Carl
Bjerrum, Lars
Strandberg, Eva Lena
Radzeviciene, Ruta
Reutskiy, Anatoliy
Caballero, Lidia
author_sort Llor, Carl
collection PubMed
description A total of 59,535 patients with respiratory tract infections were registered in the Happy Audit project, an audit-based, before-and-after study conducted in primary care centres of six countries (Argentina, Denmark, Lithuania, Russia, Spain, and Sweden) in 2008 and 2009. An antibiotic was explicitly requested by the patient in 1,255 cases (2.1%), with a great variation across countries ranging from 0.4%–4.9%. Antibiotics were significantly more often prescribed to patients requesting them compared to those who did not (64% vs. 28%; p < 0.001). Patients with acute exacerbations of chronic bronchitis/chronic obstructive pulmonary disease were most likely to request antibiotics while those with common colds were least likely (3.9% vs. 1.2%, respectively). The presence of tonsillar exudates and dyspnoea were more commonly associated with a demand for antibiotics. Even though physicians very often perceive that patients demand an antibiotic, the results of this study clearly show that patients only request antibiotics in a low percentage of cases. Patients were most likely to request antibiotics when they had symptoms of lower respiratory tract infections and when they came with more severe symptoms. Furthermore, there were considerable differences between countries, suggesting that the different backgrounds and traditions largely explain this variability in patients’ requests for antibiotics.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-4790264
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2013
publisher MDPI
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-47902642016-03-24 Low Request of Antibiotics from Patients with Respiratory Tract Infections in Six Countries: Results from the Happy Audit Study Llor, Carl Bjerrum, Lars Strandberg, Eva Lena Radzeviciene, Ruta Reutskiy, Anatoliy Caballero, Lidia Antibiotics (Basel) Article A total of 59,535 patients with respiratory tract infections were registered in the Happy Audit project, an audit-based, before-and-after study conducted in primary care centres of six countries (Argentina, Denmark, Lithuania, Russia, Spain, and Sweden) in 2008 and 2009. An antibiotic was explicitly requested by the patient in 1,255 cases (2.1%), with a great variation across countries ranging from 0.4%–4.9%. Antibiotics were significantly more often prescribed to patients requesting them compared to those who did not (64% vs. 28%; p < 0.001). Patients with acute exacerbations of chronic bronchitis/chronic obstructive pulmonary disease were most likely to request antibiotics while those with common colds were least likely (3.9% vs. 1.2%, respectively). The presence of tonsillar exudates and dyspnoea were more commonly associated with a demand for antibiotics. Even though physicians very often perceive that patients demand an antibiotic, the results of this study clearly show that patients only request antibiotics in a low percentage of cases. Patients were most likely to request antibiotics when they had symptoms of lower respiratory tract infections and when they came with more severe symptoms. Furthermore, there were considerable differences between countries, suggesting that the different backgrounds and traditions largely explain this variability in patients’ requests for antibiotics. MDPI 2013-11-19 /pmc/articles/PMC4790264/ /pubmed/27029315 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics2040477 Text en © 2013 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Llor, Carl
Bjerrum, Lars
Strandberg, Eva Lena
Radzeviciene, Ruta
Reutskiy, Anatoliy
Caballero, Lidia
Low Request of Antibiotics from Patients with Respiratory Tract Infections in Six Countries: Results from the Happy Audit Study
title Low Request of Antibiotics from Patients with Respiratory Tract Infections in Six Countries: Results from the Happy Audit Study
title_full Low Request of Antibiotics from Patients with Respiratory Tract Infections in Six Countries: Results from the Happy Audit Study
title_fullStr Low Request of Antibiotics from Patients with Respiratory Tract Infections in Six Countries: Results from the Happy Audit Study
title_full_unstemmed Low Request of Antibiotics from Patients with Respiratory Tract Infections in Six Countries: Results from the Happy Audit Study
title_short Low Request of Antibiotics from Patients with Respiratory Tract Infections in Six Countries: Results from the Happy Audit Study
title_sort low request of antibiotics from patients with respiratory tract infections in six countries: results from the happy audit study
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4790264/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27029315
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics2040477
work_keys_str_mv AT llorcarl lowrequestofantibioticsfrompatientswithrespiratorytractinfectionsinsixcountriesresultsfromthehappyauditstudy
AT bjerrumlars lowrequestofantibioticsfrompatientswithrespiratorytractinfectionsinsixcountriesresultsfromthehappyauditstudy
AT strandbergevalena lowrequestofantibioticsfrompatientswithrespiratorytractinfectionsinsixcountriesresultsfromthehappyauditstudy
AT radzevicieneruta lowrequestofantibioticsfrompatientswithrespiratorytractinfectionsinsixcountriesresultsfromthehappyauditstudy
AT reutskiyanatoliy lowrequestofantibioticsfrompatientswithrespiratorytractinfectionsinsixcountriesresultsfromthehappyauditstudy
AT caballerolidia lowrequestofantibioticsfrompatientswithrespiratorytractinfectionsinsixcountriesresultsfromthehappyauditstudy