Inclining Trend of the Researchers Interest in Antimicrobial Stewardship: A Systematic Review

INTRODUCTION: The implementation of antibiotic stewardship programs (ASPs) can improve the treatment of infections and can decrease the adverse events that result from antibiotics use. In the last decades, there is an increasing interest of the researchers in the implementation of ASPs. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The articles published in different journals were retrieved by searching many research databases such as Cochrane library, Europe PMC, PubMed, and Web of Science; we searched these databases for all published articles till November 2018. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: The searching results using Cochrane library showed an increase in the number of randomized clinical trials that related to the keyword of “antimicrobial stewardship” specially in the last 5 years. Using Europe PMC, we found 6178 results. From these results, there are 3874 free full texts. In addition, there are 2132 original articles in PubMed and by searching Web of Science database till November 8 there are 3085 results. These results show that the number of trusted published articles was increased continuously; this shows the increasing interest of the researchers in ASPs. These researches will help health-care providers to use antibiotics appropriately and to overcome the barriers of implementing ASPs. CONCLUSION: The results of this study show that the researchers had high levels of interest in participating in research activities related to the appropriate use on antibiotics and the implementation of antimicrobial stewardship programs.