Increasing the documentation of 48-hour antimicrobial reviews

• Published in: BMJ open quality Vol. 9; no. 1; p. e000805
• Main Authors: Sahota, Ramandeep Singh, Rajan, Kiran Kasper, Comont, Jonathan Mark Sabine, Lee, Hyungeun Hans, Johnston, Nikolina, James, Mary, Patel, Rakhee, Nariculam, Joseph
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England British Medical Journal Publishing Group 06.02.2020; BMJ Publishing Group LTD; BMJ Publishing Group
• Subjects: Anti-Infective Agents - administration & dosage; Anti-Infective Agents - pharmacology; Anti-Infective Agents - therapeutic use; antibiotic management; Antibiotics; Antimicrobial agents; Antimicrobial Stewardship - methods; Antimicrobial Stewardship - standards; Antimicrobial Stewardship - statistics & numerical data; Clinical practice guidelines; Data collection; Documentation; Documentation - methods; Documentation - standards; Documentation - statistics & numerical data; Drug resistance; Drug Resistance, Bacterial - drug effects; Drug stores; Guideline Adherence - standards; Guideline Adherence - statistics & numerical data; Hospitals; Humans; Medical students; Patient safety; Pharmacists; Practice Patterns, Physicians' - standards; Prescriptions; Quality control; Quality Improvement; Quality Improvement Report; Students; clinical practice guidelines; quality improvement; antibiotic management
• ISSN: 2399-6641; 2399-6641
• DOI: 10.1136/bmjoq-2019-000805

Antimicrobial resistance is a growing problem worldwide. Encouraging antimicrobial stewardship can help to reduce the negative consequences of inappropriate antibiotic use. This quality improvement project targets to do this by aiming to improve the proportion of 48-hour antimicrobial reviews completed and documented on two surgical wards at Darent Valley Hospital with a goal of 100% compliance.This project used four PDSA (plan, do, study, act) cycles to achieve our aim: a trust-wide email; education sessions with junior doctors; sticker reminders in patient notes; presenting our study to surgical consultants and displaying posters on the wards.The proportion of antimicrobial reviews completed at 48 hours in the patient notes increased from 18% to 77% over 19 weeks from 10 October 2018 to 20 February 2019. The most successful intervention was providing a presentation for consultants at an audit meeting in conjunction with displaying posters on the wards.The most successful interventions (education sessions with junior doctors and presentation to surgical consultants alongside displaying posters on the wards) were found to be those that required minimal further input after their initial rollout. This project was carried out by medical students and is highly transferrable to other hospitals, and highlighted that a successful quality improvement project can be undertaken by any member of the healthcare team.