Abstract

RAMOS MARTINEZ, A.; CORNIDE SANTOS, I.; MARCOS GARCIA, R.  and  CALVO CORBELLA, E.. Antibiotic prescription quality at an hospital emergency service. An. Med. Interna (Madrid) [online]. 2005, vol.22, n.6, pp.266-270. ISSN 0212-7199.

Introduction and aim: Many patients receive an antibiotic prescription at hospital emergency departments. It could be considered adequate if it is effective against an appropiate bacteria spectrum and the dosage prescripted is correct. The aim was to evaluate the antibiotic prescriptions quality at an hospital emergency department. Method: Restrospective study of patients attended because an infectious disease at an emergency department during a 12 days period analyzing the antibiotic prescrition quality. Results: One hundred eighty nine patients were included (48 ± 23 years; 52% women). More frequent diseases attended were respiratory infections (58 patients 31%), urinary tract infections (33 patients, 17%) and gastroenteritis (22 pacientes, 12%). Most frequent precribed antibiotic was amoxicillin with clavulanic acid (54%). In 82 cases (43%) prescription was considered incorrect. More frequent reason were having a disease that does not need antibiotics (40%), excesive dosage (27%), treatment period unaproppritate prologed (26%), short dosage (10%) and wrong antibiotic selection (5%). Conclusions: A huge proportion of patients attended at an hospital emergency departement received an inadequate antibiotic treatment. Some important measures should be undertaken in order to improve the antibiotic presciption quality.

Keywords : Emergency service; Hospital; Anti-bacterial agents; Drug resistance; Bacterial; Amoxicillin-potassium clavulanate combination.

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