Antimicrobial Stewardship Programs: Comparison of a Program with Infectious Diseases Pharmacist Support to a Program with a Geographic Pharmacist Staffing Model.

Bessesen MT, Ma A, Clegg D, Fugit RV, Pepe A, Goetz MB, Graber CJ. Antimicrobial Stewardship Programs: Comparison of a Program with Infectious Diseases Pharmacist Support to a Program with a Geographic Pharmacist Staffing Model. Hospital pharmacy. 2015 Jun 1; 50(6):477-83.

Dimensions for VA is a web-based tool available to VA staff that enables detailed searches of published research and research projects.

If you have VA-Intranet access, click here for more information vaww.hsrd.research.va.gov/dimensions/

VA staff not currently on the VA network can access Dimensions by registering for an account using their VA email address.    Search Dimensions for VA for this citation
* Don't have VA-internal network access or a VA email address? Try searching the free-to-the-public version of Dimensions

Search for Abstract from PubMed

---

Abstract:

BACKGROUND: Stewardship of antimicrobial agents is an essential function of hospital pharmacies. The ideal pharmacist staffing model for antimicrobial stewardship programs is not known. OBJECTIVE: To inform staffing decisions for antimicrobial stewardship teams, we aimed to compare an antimicrobial stewardship program with a dedicated Infectious Diseases (ID) pharmacist (Dedicated ID Pharmacist Hospital) to a program relying on ward pharmacists for stewardship activities (Geographic Model Hospital). METHODS: We reviewed a randomly selected sample of 290 cases of inpatient parenteral antibiotic use. The electronic medical record was reviewed for compliance with indicators of appropriate antimicrobial stewardship. RESULTS: At the hospital staffed by a dedicated ID pharmacist, 96.8% of patients received initial antimicrobial therapy that adhered to local treatment guidelines compared to 87% of patients at the hospital that assigned antimicrobial stewardship duties to ward pharmacists (P < .002). Therapy was modified within 24 hours of availability of laboratory data in 86.7% of cases at the Dedicated ID Pharmacist Hospital versus 72.6% of cases at the Geographic Model Hospital (P < .03). When a patient's illness was determined not to be caused by a bacterial infection, antibiotics were discontinued in 78.0% of cases at the Dedicated ID Pharmacist Hospital and in 33.3% of cases at the Geographic Model Hospital (P < .0002). CONCLUSION: An antimicrobial stewardship program with a dedicated ID pharmacist was associated with greater adherence to recommended antimicrobial therapy practices when compared to a stewardship program that relied on ward pharmacists.