Cultures of resistance? A Bourdieusian analysis of doctors' antibiotic prescribing

The social experience of uncertainty: a qualitative analysis of emergency department care for suspected pneumonia for the design of decision support

BACKGROUND

This study sought to understand the process of clinical decision-making for suspected pneumonia by emergency departments (ED) providers in Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Centers. The long-term goal of this work is to create clinical decision support tools to reduce unwarranted variation in diagnosis and treatment of suspected pneumonia.

METHODS

Semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with 16 ED clinicians from 9 VA facilities demonstrating variation in antibiotic and hospitalization decisions. Interviews of ED providers focused on understanding decision making for provider-selected pneumonia cases and providers' organizational contexts.

RESULTS

Thematic analysis identified four salient themes: i) ED decision-making for suspected pneumonia is a social process; ii) the "diagnosis drives treatment" paradigm is poorly suited to pneumonia decision-making in the ED; iii) The unpredictability of the ED requires deliberate and effortful information management by providers in CAP decision-making; and iv) the emotional stakes and high uncertainty of pneumonia care drive conservative decision making.

CONCLUSIONS

Ensuring CDS reflects the realities of clinical work as a socially organized process with high uncertainty may ultimately improve communication between ED and admitting providers, continuity of care and patient outcomes.

Antimicrobial prescribing in French nursing homes and interventions for antimicrobial stewardship: a qualitative study

BACKGROUND

Overuse of antibiotics is frequent in nursing homes (NHs) leading to adverse events and selection of resistant bacteria. Antimicrobial stewardship interventions showed heterogeneous effects on reducing inappropriate use of antimicrobials in NHs.

OBJECTIVES

This study aimed (1) to analyze antimicrobial prescribing determinants in NHs; (2) to identify which resources for antimicrobial prescribing are used by NHs' physicians (3) understand which antimicrobial stewardship interventions are required and how they should be implemented in NHs.

METHODS

We conducted individual semi-directed interviews with NHs' prescribing physicians in Ile-de-France, France. A thematic content analysis was conducted iteratively.

RESULTS

Thirteen interviews were conducted. Participants were mostly women, with a median age of 48 years and a median professional experience in NHs of three years. Participants included medical coordinators, general practitioners and salaried physicians. Main determinants of antimicrobial prescribing in NHs were the perceived risk of infectious complications and discomfort in residents, the difficulty in obtaining microbiological samples and the lack of healthcare professionals to monitor patients. Most participants reported using national guidelines and electronic decision support systems to guide their antimicrobial prescribing. Institutional constraints accentuate situations of doubt and prompt physicians to prescribe antimicrobials "just in case" despite the will to follow guidelines and the known risks of antimicrobial misuse. Physicians stated that proper antimicrobial use in NHs would require a major effort but was not judged a priority as compared to other medical issues. Producing guidelines tailored to the NH's context, performing good practice audits with feedback on antimicrobial prescribing, and reinforcing multidisciplinary relationships and discussions between city and hospital professionals were cited as potential interventions. The role of the medical coordinator was described as central. According to physicians, collaboration among stakeholders, providing support and training during the process might prove effective strategies to ensure successful implementation.

CONCLUSION

Antimicrobial prescribing is a complex decision-making process involving different factors and actors in NHs. Tailored guidelines, good practice audits, strengthened multidisciplinary collaboration were proposed as key AMS interventions. Physicians emphasized the central role of the medical coordinator supported by stakeholder engagement, collaboration, training and ongoing support for successful implementation.

Cultures of Activity, Cultivating Resistance

The problem of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is often viewed through biomedical and/or behavioral lenses, with the underlying economic principles and "headwinds" shaping resistance less visible. In this paper, we focus on how healthcare funding models structure the ways AMR is perceived and addressed as an institutional priority. Specifically, we explore how activity-based funding reflects and operationalizes ingrained assumptions about what is valuable and/or worthwhile within the organizational ecology of the hospital. Drawing on interviews with 36 executives from several hospital clinical care settings across two Australian states, we illuminate the ways the activity-based funding paradigm works against efforts to combat AMR. Concerningly, we further observe how activity-based funding models can inadvertently position rising rates of resistance as a benefit-at least in the short term-as the new and intensified interventions required to address resistant infections require more "activity" and thus deliver higher reimbursement at the level of annualized budgets. In failing to recognize the (social and economic) value of reduced activity, activity-based funding risks contributing to AMR, rather than working to resolve it.

Regulating antimicrobial use within hospitals: A qualitative study

OBJECTIVES

To examine how regulatory structures and processes focused on antimicrobial stewardship and antimicrobial resistance are experienced by hospital managers and clinicians.

METHODS

Forty-two hospital managers and clinicians working within accreditation and antimicrobial stewardship teams in three Australian hospitals participated in individual in-depth interviews. Thematic analysis was performed.

RESULTS

Thematic analysis revealed participants' experiences of hospital antimicrobial regulation and their perceptions of what would be required for meaningful antimicrobial optimisation. Theme 1: Experience of regulation of antimicrobials within hospitals: Participants described an increased profile of antimicrobial resistance with inclusion in regulatory requirements, but also the risks of bureaucratic manoeuvring to meet standards rather than governance-inducing systemic changes. Theme 2: Growth of accreditation processes and hospitals over time: Both regulatory requirements and hospitals were described as evolving over time, each manoeuvring in response to each other (e.g. development of short notice accreditation). Theme 3: Perceived requirements for change: Participants perceived a need for top-down buy-in, resource prioritisation, complex understanding of power and influence on clinician behaviour, and a critical need for medical engagement.

CONCLUSIONS

This study around antimicrobials shows the tension and dynamic relationship between regulatory processes and hospital responses, bringing to light the enduring balance of a system that positions itself to meet regulatory requirements and emerging "demands", without necessarily addressing the key underlying concerns. Antimicrobial resistance-related solutions are perceived as likely to require further resourcing and buy-in across multiple levels, engagement across professional streams and require strategies that consider complex systems change in order for regulatory structures to have potency.

A qualitative analysis of the unwritten rules influencing antibiotic prescribing practices among French poultry veterinarians

Background

It is now recognized that a better understanding of prescriber behaviour is needed to improve antimicrobial stewardship programmes. Most studies conducted in the livestock sector have focused on farmers' perspectives, while the prescribing habits of veterinarians have remained overlooked.

Objective

Our study explored the psychosocial determinants associated with antibiotic prescribing practices in the French poultry sector by analysing the informal norms and unwritten rules that influence veterinarians' prescribing decisions.

Methods

A qualitative study was conducted in four French regions in February 2021. Using the biographical narrative interpretive method, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 16 poultry veterinarians with varying professional experience. Three main themes were retained for data analysis: (i) compliance with and deviations from prescribing recommendations, (ii) the influence of fellow veterinarians on antibiotic decisions and (iii) the key role of veterinary corporate groups.

Results

When prescribing antibiotics, junior veterinarians were strongly influenced by senior veterinarians who acted as role models driving clinical practices. Prescribing habits were shared through peer networks in which veterinarians participated throughout their careers. Finally, veterinary corporate groups helped to shape veterinarians' prescribing habits by promoting existing guidelines and even producing in-house recommendations.

Conclusions

We show that, in parallel with official guidelines, prescribing habits circulate among veterinarians and are shared in professional circles. Therefore, antimicrobial stewardship interventions should focus not only on official guidelines and communication channels, but also unwritten professional rules and organizations influencing veterinarians' prescribing practices.

To swab or not to swab? A qualitative study of pathology testing, interpretation, and value in diabetes-related foot ulceration

BACKGROUND

Diagnostic testing has been proposed as a key strategy to tackle escalating antimicrobial resistance (AMR). However, effectiveness of testing is limited by the complexities of the hospital environment, including human factors.

OBJECTIVES

To examine swab-testing in diabetes-related foot infections as a case study of the factors impacting microbiology testing use, efficacy, and antimicrobial resistance.

METHODS

Seventeen clinicians involved in the management of diabetes-related foot infections, including podiatrists, nurses, and doctors, participated in in-depth individual interviews conducted by a qualitative researcher on the investigation and management of diabetes-related foot infections. Thematic analysis was performed.

RESULTS

The multilayered and evolving features of the human-diagnostic interface were described by participants as potential barriers to effective swab-testing in clinical care, including diagnostic training and interpretation deficits; communication difficulties; interpretation deficits and diagnostic assumptions; the influence of inter-professional dynamics; and flow-on consequences for patient decisions and care.

CONCLUSIONS

Swab-testing has been used for over 100 years, and yet there remain substantial factors that limit their effective use in clinical practice as demonstrated by this study. A focus on upscaling diagnostic testing, particularly with escalating AMR, without considering complex implementation and human factors is likely to have limited impact on practice improvement. This study identified vulnerability points in the human-diagnostic interaction which should be considered in the implementation of other microbiological tests. This study on the simple wound swab has implications for future diagnostic upscaling and investment, including its role in address antimicrobial resistance.

Pharmacist insights into antimicrobial stewardship: A social marketing approach

BACKGROUND

Antimicrobial resistance is a worldwide public health problem. Antimicrobial stewardship programs (ASPs) optimize antimicrobial use within hospitals. The social marketing framework has been used in analyzing systems and devising best practices.

OBJECTIVE

(s): To use the social marketing framework to explore pharmacist experiences and perceptions of structural, behavioral and interventional strategies that support ASPs.

METHODS

A qualitative approach utilizing semi-structured individual interviews was utilized. A purposive sample of hospital pharmacists was invited to participate. An interview guide was constructed to describe participant experience and perceptions regarding ASPs in their institutions based on elements of social marketing: Behavioral goals; Customer Insight; Segmentation and Targeting; Competition; Exchange; and Marketing and Interventional mix. Interviews were recorded digitally and transcribed verbatim. Thematic analysis was conducted using deductive methods. A combination of case-based and code-based approaches allowed individual and holistic analyses respectively. Codes were collated into themes and subthemes.

RESULTS

Saturation of themes occurred with 25 interviews from 17 hospitals. ASP metrics included: consumption of antibiotics using days of therapy and defined daily dose, rates of C. difficile and multidrug resistant organisms, resistance patterns, and provider adherence to the ASP. Active stewardship tools such as preauthorization, and prospective feedback/audit were preferred over passive tools such as order sets and automatic stop orders. A physician champion and a clinical pharmacist with infectious disease training were core elements in the multidisciplinary team. Despite certain areas being considered key for stewardship, participants emphasized a hospital-wide approach including outpatient departments; discharge stewardship emerged as a primary theme. Leadership supported ASPs with finances, rapid and novel diagnostics, Clinical Decision Support Systems, mobile technology, and continuous staff training.

CONCLUSIONS

The social marketing framework has been used to explore pharmacist perceptions that inform successful qualities including metrics, restriction methods, personnel, benefits, barriers, training needs/modes, and promotional avenues that support ASPs in hospitals.

Etiquette of the antibiotic decision-making process for surgical prophylaxis in Ethiopia: a triangulated ethnographic study

Background

Prophylactic antibiotics reduce surgery-associated infections and healthcare costs. While quantitative methods have been widely used to evaluate antibiotic use practices in surgical wards, they fall short of fully capturing the intricacies of antibiotic decision-making in these settings. Qualitative methods can bridge this gap by delving into the often-overlooked healthcare customs that shape antibiotic prescribing practices.

Aim

This study aimed to explore the etiquette of the antibiotic decision-making process of surgical prophylaxis antibiotic use at Tikur Anbessa Specialized Hospital (TASH).

Methods

The observational study was carried out at TASH, a teaching and referral hospital in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from 26 August 2021 to 1 January 2022. Overall, 21 business ward rounds, 30 medical record reviews, and 11 face-to-face interviews were performed sequentially to triangulate and cross-validate the qualitative observation. The data were collected until saturation. The data were cleaned, coded, summarized, and analyzed using the thematic analysis approach.

Result

Surgical antibiotic prophylaxis (SAP) discussions were infrequent during surgical ward rounds in TASH, leading to practices that deviated from established recommendations. Clear documentation differentiating SAP from other antibiotic uses was also lacking, which contributed to unjustified extended SAP use in the postoperative period. Missed SAP documentation was common for emergency surgeries, as well as initial dose timing and pre-operative metronidazole administration. Importantly, there was no standardized facility guideline or clinical protocol for SAP use. Furthermore, SAP prescriptions were often signed by junior residents and medical interns, and administration was typically handled by anesthesiologists/anesthetists at the operating theater and by nurses in the wards. This suggests a delegation of SAP decision-making from surgeons to senior residents, then to junior residents, and finally to medical interns. Moreover, there was no adequate representation from pharmacy, nursing, and other staff during ward rounds.

Conclusion

Deeply ingrained customs hinder evidence-based SAP decisions, leading to suboptimal practices and increased surgical site infection risks. Engaging SAP care services and implementing antimicrobial stewardship practices could optimize SAP usage and mitigate SSI risks.

A qualitative evaluation of frontline clinician perspectives toward antibiotic stewardship programs

OBJECTIVE

To examine the perspectives of caregivers that are not part of the antibiotic stewardship program (ASP) leadership team (eg, physicians, nurses, and clinical pharmacists), but who interact with ASPs in their role as frontline healthcare workers.

DESIGN

Qualitative semistructured interviews.

SETTING

The study was conducted in 2 large national healthcare systems including 7 hospitals in the Veterans' Health Administration and 4 hospitals in Intermountain Healthcare.

PARTICIPANTS

We interviewed 157 participants. The current analysis includes 123 nonsteward clinicians: 47 physicians, 26 pharmacists, 29 nurses, and 21 hospital leaders.

METHODS

Interviewers utilized a semistructured interview guide based on the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR), which was tailored to the participant's role in the hospital as it related to ASPs. Qualitative analysis was conducted using a codebook based on the CFIR.

RESULTS

We identified 4 primary perspectives regarding ASPs. (1) Non-ASP pharmacists considered antibiotic stewardship activities to be a high priority despite the added burden to work duties: (2) Nurses acknowledged limited understanding of ASP activities or involvement with these programs; (3) Physicians criticized ASPs for their restrictions on clinical autonomy and questioned the ability of antibiotic stewards to make recommendations without the full clinical picture; And (4) hospital leaders expressed support for ASPs and recognized the unique challenges faced by non-ASP clinical staff.

CONCLUSION

Further understanding these differing perspectives of ASP implementation will inform possible ways to improve ASP implementation across clinical roles.

Validation, visibility, vagueness and variation: A qualitative assessment of existing veterinary guidelines for antimicrobial use in cattle and sheep in the UK

Antimicrobials are essential in veterinary medicine to treat and control bacterial disease in animals. Their prudent use in food-producing animals has been encouraged to reduce the development and spread of antimicrobial resistance. National and international guidelines for responsible antimicrobial use have been developed as tools to guide and rationalise antimicrobial prescribing decisions by veterinarians and usage decisions by farmers. Yet, there is little understanding of whether these existing guidelines are fit for purpose. Accordingly, this study rigorously assessed 128 veterinary guidelines for antimicrobial use in ruminants in the UK, following established qualitative methodologies. Findings revealed four pertinent themes: validation of the veterinarian as the prescriber, visibility of responsible use realities, vagueness in interpretation and variation in directing behaviour. These themes encompassed the roles and responsibilities of the veterinarian and the realities of prescribing scenarios, alongside concerns relating to the specificity within and variation between guidelines. Resultant recommendations to inform and support the future development of guidelines include establishing species-specific and disease-specific guidelines, expanding guidelines to include disease prevention measures, including definitions to resolve vagueness and promoting congruence in interpretation, encouraging the development of practice-level guidelines to endorse collaboration and ownership, and fostering active working between stakeholders to align priorities and messaging.

Antibiotics in Catalan Primary Care: Prescription, Use and Remedies for a Crisis of Care

Antimicrobial resistance is one of the twenty-first century's major health challenges. Linked to the extensive use of antibiotics and other antimicrobials, resistance occurs when microbes stop responding to medications. Rates of antibiotic consumption in Spain are among the highest in Europe. Drawing on research conducted in Catalonia, in this article we present findings from ethnographic fieldwork and semi-structured interviews with general practitioners, residents of Barcelona, and professionals who have worked in antibiotic stewardship. We argue that the circulation of antibiotics should be understood in relation to broader historical processes and the deficient systems of health and social care provision they have produced.

How can lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic enhance antimicrobial resistance surveillance and stewardship?

COVID-19 demanded urgent and immediate global attention, during which other public health crises such as antimicrobial resistance (AMR) increased silently, undermining patient safety and the life-saving ability of several antimicrobials. In 2019, WHO declared AMR a top ten global public health threat facing humanity, with misuse and overuse of antimicrobials as the main drivers in the development of antimicrobial-resistant pathogens. AMR is steadily on the rise, especially in low-income and middle-income countries across south Asia, South America, and Africa. Extraordinary circumstances often demand an extraordinary response as did the COVID-19 pandemic, underscoring the fragility of health systems across the world and forcing governments and global agencies to think creatively. The key strategies that helped to contain the increasing SARS-CoV-2 infections included a focus on centralised governance with localised implementation, evidence-based risk communication and community engagement, use of technological methods for tracking and accountability, extensive expansion of access to diagnostics, and a global adult vaccination programme. The extensive and indiscriminate use of antimicrobials to treat patients, particularly in the early phase of the pandemic, have adversely affected AMR stewardship practices. However, there were important lessons learnt during the pandemic, which can be leveraged to strengthen surveillance and stewardship, and revitalise efforts to address the AMR crisis.

The healthcare field as a marketplace: general practitioners, pharmaceutical companies, and profit-led prescribing in Pakistan

Incentivisation of general practitioners (GPs) by pharmaceutical companies is thought to affect prescribing practices, often not in patients' interest. Using a Bourdieusian lens, we examine the socially structured conditions that underpin exchanges between pharmaceutical companies and GPs in Pakistan. The analysis of qualitative interviews with 28 GPs and 13 pharmaceutical sales representatives (PSRs) shows that GPs, through prescribing medicines, met pharmaceutical sales targets in exchange for various incentives. We argue that these practices can be given meaning through the concept of 'field' - a social space in which GPs, PSRs, and pharmacists were hierarchically positioned, with their unique capacities, to enable healthcare provision. However, structural forces like the intense competition between pharmaceutical companies, the presence of unqualified healthcare providers in the healthcare market, and a lack of regulation by the state institutions produced a context that enabled pharmaceutical companies and GPs to use the healthcare field, also, as space to maximise profits. GPs believed the effort to maximise incomes and meet socially desired standards were two key factors that encouraged profit-led prescribing. We conclude that understanding the healthcare field is an important step toward developing governance practices that can address profit-led prescribing.

Do you see the problem? Visualising a generalised 'complex local system' of antibiotic prescribing across the United Kingdom using qualitative interview data

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is often referred to as a complex problem embedded in a complex system. Despite this insight, interventions in AMR, and in particular in antibiotic prescribing, tend to be narrowly focused on the behaviour of individual prescribers using the tools of performance monitoring and management rather than attempting to bring about more systemic change. In this paper, we aim to elucidate the nature of the local antibiotic prescribing 'system' based on 71 semi-structured interviews undertaken in six local areas across the United Kingdom (UK). We applied complex systems theory and systems mapping methods to our qualitative data to deepen our understanding of the interactions among antibiotic prescribing interventions and the wider health system. We found that a complex and interacting set of proximal and distal factors can have unpredictable effects in different local systems in the UK. Ultimately, enacting performance management-based interventions in the absence of in-depth contextual understandings about other pressures prescribers face is a recipe for temporary solutions, waning intervention effectiveness, and unintended consequences. We hope our insights will enable policy makers and academics to devise and evaluate interventions in future in a manner that better reflects and responds to the dynamics of complex local prescribing systems.

Long-Term Impact of a Smartphone App on Prescriber Adherence to Antibiotic Guidelines for Adult Patients With Community-Acquired Pneumonia: Interrupted Time-Series Study

BACKGROUND

Mobile health platforms like smartphone apps that provide clinical guidelines are ubiquitous, yet their long-term impact on guideline adherence remains unclear. In 2016, an antibiotic guidelines app, called SCRIPT, was introduced in Auckland City Hospital, New Zealand, to provide local antibiotic guidelines to clinicians on their smartphones.

OBJECTIVE

We aimed to assess whether the provision of antibiotic guidelines in a smartphone app resulted in sustained changes in antibiotic guideline adherence by prescribers.

METHODS

We analyzed antibiotic guideline adherence rates during the first 24 hours of hospital admission in adults diagnosed with community-acquired pneumonia using an interrupted time-series study with 3 distinct periods post app implementation (ie, 3, 12, and 24 months).

RESULTS

Adherence increased from 23% (46/200) at baseline to 31% (73/237) at 3 months and 34% (69/200) at 12 months, reducing to 31% (62/200) at 24 months post app implementation (P=.07 vs baseline). However, increased adherence was sustained in patients with pulmonary consolidation on x-ray (9/63, 14% at baseline; 23/77, 30% after 3 months; 32/92, 35% after 12 month; and 32/102, 31% after 24 months; P=.04 vs baseline).

CONCLUSIONS

An antibiotic guidelines app increased overall adherence, but this was not sustained. In patients with pulmonary consolidation, the increased adherence was sustained.

Cultures of antibiotic prescribing in medical intensive care

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) continues to present a challenge to international healthcare systems and structures of public health. The focus on optimizing antibiotic prescribing in human populations has challenged healthcare systems charged with making responsible their physician-prescribers. In the United States, physicians in almost every specialty and role use antibiotics as part of their therapeutic armamentariums. In United States hospitals, most patients are administered antibiotics during their stay. Therefore, antibiotic prescribing and utilization is a commonly accepted part of medical practice. In this paper, we utilize social science work on antibiotic prescribing to examine a critical space of care in United States hospital settings. From March to August 2018, we used ethnographic methods to study hospital-based medical intensive care unit physicians at the offices and hospital floors they frequent in two urban United States teaching hospitals. We focused on eliciting the interactions and discussions surrounding antibiotic decision-making that are uniquely influenced by the context of medical intensive care units. We argue that antibiotic use in the medical intensive care units under study was shaped by urgency, hierarchy, and uncertainty representative of the medical intensive care unit's role within the larger hospital system. We conclude that by studying the culture of antibiotic prescribing in medical intensive care units, we can see more clearly both the vulnerability of the looming antimicrobial resistance crisis and by contrast the perceived insignificance of stewarding antibiotic use when considered alongside the fragility of life amidst acute medical concerns regularly experienced in the unit.

Determinants of antimicrobial resistance occurrence in animal-based food, perceived by livestock farmers: A qualitative phenomenological study

Background and Purpose of the Study

The determinants of antimicrobial resistance in human medicine have been copiously explored. On the other hand, the existing research in veterinary medicine and animal husbandry is in its infancy. The present qualitative study used the one-health approach to explore farmers' attitudes toward antimicrobial use and antimicrobial stewardship.

Methodology

The present qualitative study was phenomenological in type. It was conducted in 2022 in the two cities of Kerman and Bandar Abbas in Iran. The data were collected through in-depth interviews by semistructured interviews with 17 livestock, poultry, and aquatic animal breeders selected through purposive sampling. The interviews lasted between 35 and 65 min in the Farsi language. The data were analyzed using conventional qualitative content analysis and Colaizzi's seven-step analysis technique.

Results

The open coding was done in MAXQDA 10 and the results of data analysis were classified into five main themes and 17 subthemes subcategories. The main categories include personal determinants, contextual determinants, legal and regulatory determinants, social determinants, and economic determinants.

Conclusion

Considering the increasing use of antibiotics among livestock farmers and breeders of animals used as human food, different measures such as educational, regulatory, social, and even cultural interventions may be able to control and prevent antimicrobial resistance.

Patient expectations do matter - Experimental evidence on antibiotic prescribing decisions among hospital-based physicians

BACKGROUND

The global public health crisis of antibiotic resistance is being driven in part by over prescription of antibiotics. We aimed to assess the relative weight of patient expectations, clinical uncertainty, and past behaviour on hospital-based physicians' antibiotic prescribing decisions.

METHODS

A discrete choice experiment was administered among hospital-based physicians in Tuscany, Italy. Respondents were asked to choose in which of two clinical scenarios they would be more likely to prescribe antibiotics, with the two cases differing in levels of clinical uncertainty, patient expectations, and the physician's past behaviour. We fitted a conditional logistic regression.

RESULTS

Respondents included 1,436 hospital-based physicians. Results show that the odds of prescribing antibiotics decrease when a patient requests it (OR=0.80, 95%CI [0.72,0.89]) and increase when the physician has prescribed antibiotics to a patient under similar circumstances previously (OR=1.15, 95%CI [1.03,1.27]). We found no significant effect of clinical uncertainty on the odds of prescribing antibiotics (OR=0.96, 95%CI [0.87, 1.07]).

CONCLUSIONS

We show that patient expectation has a significant negative association with antibiotic prescribing among hospital-based physicians. Our findings speak to the importance of cultural context in shaping the physician's disposition when confronted with patient expectations. We suggest shared decision-making to improve prudent prescribing without compromising on patient satisfaction.

Coping with in-locus factors and systemic contradictions affecting antibiotic prescription and dispensing practices in primary care-A qualitative One Health study in Brazil

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is an increasing threat to global health. The risks and sanitary consequences of AMR are disproportionately experienced by those living in Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs). While addressing antibiotic use has largely been documented in hospital settings, the understanding of social drivers affecting antibiotic prescribing and dispensing practices in the context of human and animal health in primary care (PC) in LMICs remains extremely limited. We seek to explore how in-locus and multi-level social factors influence antibiotic prescriptions and dispensing practices in the context of human and animal health in primary care in Brazil. This is a baseline qualitative One Health study; semi-structured interviews and field observations were undertaken in primary care sites located in a socioeconomically vulnerable area in the city of São Paulo, the most populated city of Brazil. Twenty-five human and animal healthcare professionals (HP) were purposely sampled. Interview data were subject to thematic analysis. Three overlapping social drivers were identified across HPs' discourses: individual and behavioral challenges; relational and contextual factors influencing the overprescription of antibiotics (AB); and structural barriers and systemic contradictions in the health system. As a result of the interaction between multilevel in-locus and structural and contextual factors, HPs experience contextual and territorial challenges that directly influence their risk perception, diagnosis, use of laboratorial and image exams, time and decision to undergo treatment, choice of AB and strategies in coping with AB prescriptions. Additionally, in-locus factors influencing antibiotic prescriptions and dispensing practices are intertwined with individual accounts of risk management, systemic contradictions and ambivalences in the national health system. Our findings suggest interventions tackling AB use and AMR in Brazil should consider the social context, the complex health system structure and current integrated programs and services in PC.

Improving paediatric antimicrobial stewardship in remote and regional Queensland hospitals: development and qualitative evaluation of a tailored intervention for intravenous-to-oral antibiotic switching

OBJECTIVES

Timely intravenous-to-oral antibiotic switching for children is important for paediatric antimicrobial stewardship (AMS). However, low decision-making confidence and fragmentation of patient care can hamper implementation, with difficulties heightened regionally where AMS programmes for children are lacking. The aim of this study was to develop and evaluate user-led creation and implementation of an intervention package for early intravenous-to-oral switching at regional hospitals in Queensland, Australia.

DESIGN

Guided by theory, a four-phase approach was used to: (1) develop multifaceted intervention materials; (2) review materials and their usage through stakeholders; (3) adapt materials based on user-feedback and (4) qualitatively evaluate health workers experiences at 6 months postintervention.

SETTING

Seven regional hospitals in Queensland, Australia.

PARTICIPANTS

Phase 2 included 15 stakeholders; health workers and patient representatives (patient-guardians and Indigenous liaison officers). Phase 4 included 20 health workers across the seven intervention sites.

RESULTS

Content analysis of health worker and parent/guardian reviews identified the 'perceived utility of materials' and 'possible barriers to use'. 'Recommendations and strategies for improvement' provided adjustments for the materials that were able to be tailored to individual practice. Postintervention interviews generated three overarching themes that combined facilitators and barriers to switching: (1) application of materials, (2) education and support, and (3) team dynamics. Overall, despite difficulties with turnover and problems with the medical hierarchy, interventions aided and empowered antibiotic therapy decision-making and enhanced education and self-reflection.

CONCLUSIONS

Despite structural barriers to AMS for switching from intravenous-to-oral antibiotics in paediatric patients, offering a tailored multifaceted intervention was reported to provide support and confidence to adjust practice across a diverse set of health workers in regional areas. Future AMS activities should be guided by users and provide opportunities for tailoring tools to practice setting and patients' requirements.

Growth Culture and Public Hospital Performance: The Mediating Effect of Job Satisfaction and Person-Organization Fit

This study investigates and interprets the role of growth organizational culture (GOC), person-organization fit (POF) and job satisfaction (JS) in predicting hospital performance (HP). This research adopted a quantitative methodology using data collected from 513 respondents in three cities across China. Smart-PLS 3 was used to evaluate the measurement model and structural model. Growth organizational culture has a significant positive impact on hospital performance (β = 0.191, p < 0.001). Person-organization fit (54.74%) and job satisfaction (29.26%) have partial mediating effects between growth culture and hospital performance. The research revealed that the GOC, POF, and JS play a substantial role in promoting HP. All the direct relationships were positive and significant. The findings suggest that establishing a growth culture environment for physicians is an effective strategy to improve physicians' job satisfaction and person-organization fit. This strategy provides a new path to improve the hospitals performance through promoting organizational culture. Future studies should test the findings in an interventional design.

The New Precision Stewards?

The precision health era is likely to reduce and respond to antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Our stewardship and precision efforts share terminology, seeking to deliver the “right drug, at the right dose, at the right time.” Already, rapid diagnostic testing, phylogenetic surveillance, and real-time outbreak response provide just a few examples of molecular advances we dub “precision stewardship.” However, the AMR causal factors range from the molecular to that of global health policy. Mirroring the cross-sectoral nature of AMR science, the research addressing the ethical, legal and social implications (ELSI) of AMR ranges across academic scholarship. As the rise of AMR is accompanied by an escalating sense of its moral and social significance, what is needed is a parallel field of study. In this paper, we offer a gap analysis of this terrain, or an agenda for “the ELSI of precision stewardship.” In the first section, we discuss the accomplishments of a multi-decade U.S. national investment in ELSI research attending to the advances in human genetics. In the next section, we provide an overview of distinct ELSI topics pertinent to AMR. The distinctiveness of an ELSI agenda for precision stewardship suggests new opportunities for collaboration to build the stewardship teams of the future.

Tipping the balance: A systematic review and meta-ethnography to unfold the complexity of surgical antimicrobial prescribing behavior in hospital settings

Surgical specialties account for a high proportion of antimicrobial use in hospitals, and misuse has been widely reported resulting in unnecessary patient harm and antimicrobial resistance. We aimed to synthesize qualitative studies on surgical antimicrobial prescribing behavior, in hospital settings, to explain how and why contextual factors act and interact to influence practice. Stakeholder engagement was integrated throughout to ensure consideration of varying interpretive repertoires and that the findings were clinically meaningful. The meta-ethnography followed the seven phases outlined by Noblit and Hare. Eight databases were systematically searched without date restrictions. Supplementary searches were performed including forwards and backwards citation chasing and contacting first authors of included papers to highlight further work. Following screening, 14 papers were included in the meta-ethnography. Repeated reading of this work enabled identification of 48 concepts and subsequently eight overarching concepts: hierarchy; fear drives action; deprioritized; convention trumps evidence; complex judgments; discontinuity of care; team dynamics; and practice environment. The overarching concepts interacted to varying degrees but there was no consensus among stakeholders regarding an order of importance. Further abstraction of the overarching concepts led to the development of a conceptual model and a line-of-argument synthesis, which posits that social and structural mediators influence individual complex antimicrobial judgements and currently skew practice towards increased and unnecessary antimicrobial use. Crucially, our model provides insights into how we might ‘tip the balance’ towards more evidence-based antimicrobial use. Currently, healthcare workers deploy antimicrobials across the surgical pathway as a safety net to allay fears, reduce uncertainty and risk, and to mitigate against personal blame. Our synthesis indicates that prescribing is unlikely to change until the social and structural mediators driving practice are addressed. Furthermore, it suggests that research specifically exploring the context for effective and sustainable quality improvement stewardship initiatives in surgery is now urgent.

Knowledge and perceptions of Australian postgraduate veterinary students prior to formal education of antimicrobial use and antimicrobial resistance

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is widely perceived as a threat to human and animal health and a significant One Health issue with extensive and complex factors contributing to its occurrence and spread. Previous studies have surveyed human and animal health professionals to determine their perceptions regarding AMR and antimicrobial use (AMU). There are limited studies exploring the understanding of veterinary students despite their critical role as future antimicrobial prescribers. A cross-sectional survey was administered to an entire cohort of Doctor of Veterinary Medicine Year 2 (DVM2) students (n = 136) to investigate their knowledge and perceptions regarding AMR and AMU prior to formal education on this issue. Ninety students (66.2% of the cohort) completed the survey. There was overwhelming agreement regarding the immediacy of the problem, with 84.4% of students indicating that 'We must take action on AMR'. Despite more than 94.4% of students correctly defining AMR, specific knowledge regarding AMR impact, contributory causes to AMR and strategies to solve the challenge of AMR was variable. Most students perceived livestock producers to have a significant role in the perpetuation of AMR due to AMU for prophylaxis (71.1% substantial/moderate contribution) and treatment (56.7% substantial/moderate contribution). Over a third of respondents (37.8%) were unsure if AMR could spread from animals to humans. Respondents perceived that various groups (dentists, doctors, veterinarians, professional organisations) are all important in ameliorating the issue of AMR. The implementation of restrictive measures to reduce veterinary prescription of antimicrobials was viewed as less important than strategies involving education, hygiene, surveillance, and guideline development/availability. To encourage the development of good antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) practices, professional veterinary education needs to foster an understanding of the scientific, behavioural and social issues that contribute to AMR and inappropriate AMU, as well as prescribers' personal contribution to AMR perpetuation and amelioration.

Antimicrobial prescribing matters: the irreconcilability in moral ranking systems

Antimicrobial resistance caused by widespread use of antimicrobials is a defining challenge of our time. This article presents antimicrobial prescribing among physicians as a morally irreconcilable endeavour. Particularly, the physician may have no good option when antimicrobial resistance is seen as both (1) a global threat to be addressed at the population level, and (2) a threat to the individual patient to be addressed in clinical practice. This research demonstrates that in practice, the physician is presented with an irreconcilable dilemma between caring for the population or caring for the individual. The author utilizes an extended ethnographic case study of infectious disease specialists to show that physicians are pressured to use antimicrobials more responsibly for the benefit of society, yet at the same time treat the individual patients with care by administering the most effective and appropriate agents. The author concludes by suggesting that there is no straightforward answer for the practicing physician, since what ultimately matters is unlikely to satisfy either moral ranking system.

Perceptions, views and practices regarding antibiotic prescribing and stewardship among hospital physicians in Jakarta, Indonesia: a questionnaire-based survey

OBJECTIVES

Antibiotic overuse is one of the main drivers of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), especially in low-income and middle-income countries. This study aimed to understand the perceptions and views towards AMR, antibiotic prescribing practice and antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) among hospital physicians in Jakarta, Indonesia.

DESIGN

Cross-sectional, self-administered questionnaire-based survey, with descriptive statistics, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to identify distinct underlying constructs in the dataset, and multivariable linear regression of factor scores to analyse physician subgroups.

SETTING

Six public and private acute-care hospitals in Jakarta in 2019.

PARTICIPANTS

1007 of 1896 (53.1% response rate) antibiotic prescribing physicians.

RESULTS

Physicians acknowledged the significance of AMR and contributing factors, rational antibiotic prescribing, and purpose and usefulness of AMS. However, this conflicted with reported suboptimal local hospital practices, such as room cleaning, hand hygiene and staff education, and views regarding antibiotic decision making. These included insufficiently applying AMS principles and utilising microbiology, lack of confidence in prescribing decisions and defensive prescribing due to pervasive diagnostic uncertainty, fear of patient deterioration or because patients insisted. EFA identified six latent factors (overall Crohnbach's α=0.85): awareness of AMS activities; awareness of AMS purpose; views regarding rational antibiotic prescribing; confidence in antibiotic prescribing decisions; perception of AMR as a significant problem; and immediate actions to contain AMR. Factor scores differed across hospitals, departments, work experience and medical hierarchy.

CONCLUSIONS

AMS implementation in Indonesian hospitals is challenged by institutional, contextual and diagnostic vulnerabilities, resulting in externalising AMR instead of recognising it as a local problem. Appropriate recognition of the contextual determinants of antibiotic prescribing decision making will be critical to change physicians' attitudes and develop context-specific AMS interventions.

Hospital-Based Antimicrobial Stewardship Programs Used in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Scoping Review

The burden of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is considerable in many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), and it is important to describe the antimicrobial stewardship program (ASP) activities found in these countries and report their impact. Importantly, as these programs target prescribing behavior, the factors influencing prescription of antimicrobials must also be taken into account. This scoping review aimed to (1) describe hospital-based ASP activities, (2) report methods used to measure the impact of ASPs, and (3) explore factors influencing antimicrobial prescribing behavior in LMICs. PubMed was searched from database inception until April 2021. Factors influencing antimicrobial prescribing behavior were canvassed using the Capability-Opportunity-Motivation and Behavior framework. Most of ASP studies in LMICs were predominantly conducted in tertiary care and university-based hospitals. Audit of antimicrobial prescriptions with feedback and restrictive-based strategies was the main reported activity. Total antimicrobial consumption was the main method used to measure the impact of ASPs. Positive outcomes were observed for both clinical and microbiological outcomes; however, these were measured from nonrandomized controlled trials. Dominant factors identified through the behavioral framework were a limited awareness of AMR as a local problem, a perception that overprescription of antimicrobials had limited consequences and was mainly driven by a motivation to help improve patient outcomes. In addition, antimicrobial prescribing practices were largely influenced by existing hierarchy among prescribers. Our scoping review suggests that LMICs need to evaluate antimicrobial appropriateness as an added measure to assess impact. Furthermore, improvements in the access of microbiology and diagnostic facilities and ensuring ASP champions are recruited from senior prescribers will positively influence antimicrobial prescribing behavior, helping improve stewardship of antimicrobials in these countries.

Ethics and antibiotic resistance

INTRODUCTION OR BACKGROUND

Antibiotic resistance raises ethical issues due to the severe and inequitably distributed consequences caused by individual actions and policies.

SOURCES OF DATA

Synthesis of ethical, scientific and clinical literature.

AREAS OF AGREEMENT

Ethical analyses have focused on the moral responsibilities of patients to complete antibiotic courses, resistance as a tragedy of the commons and attempts to limit use through antibiotic stewardship.

AREAS OF CONTROVERSY

Each of these analyses has significant limitations and can result in self-defeating or overly narrow implications for policy.

GROWING POINTS

More complex analyses focus on ethical implications of ubiquitous asymptomatic carriage of resistant bacteria, non-linear outcomes within and between patients over time and global variation in resistant disease burdens.

AREAS TIMELY FOR DEVELOPING RESEARCH

Neglected topics include the harms of antibiotic use, including off-target effects on the human microbiome, and the lack of evidence guiding most antibiotic prescription decisions.

Getting palliative medications right across the contexts of homes, hospitals and hospices: protocol to synthesise scoping review and ethnographic methods in an activity theory analysis

INTRODUCTION

Prescribing and medication use in palliative care is a multistep process. It requires systems coordination and is enacted through activities of patients, informal carers and professionals. This study compares practice to idealised descriptions of what should happen; identifying when, how and why process disturbances impact on quality and safety. Our objectives are to:Document an intended model (phase 1, scoping review).Refine the model with study of practice (phase 2, ethnography).Use the model to pinpoint 'hot' (viewed as problematic by participants) and 'cold' spots (observed as problematic by researchers) within or when patients move across three contexts-hospice, hospital and community (home).Create learning recommendations for quality and safety targeted at underlying themes and contributing factors.

METHODS AND ANALYSIS

The review will scope Ovid Medline, CINAHL and Embase, Google Scholar and Images-no date limits, English language only. The Population (palliative), Concept (medication use), Context (home, hospice, hospital) framework defines inclusion/exclusion criteria. Data will be extracted to create a model illustrating how processes ideally occur, incorporating multiple steps of typical episodes of prescribing and medication use for symptom control. Direct observations, informal conversations around acts of prescribing and medication use, and semistructured interviews will be conducted with a purposive sample of patients, carers and professionals. Drawing on activity theory, we will synthesise analysis of both phases. The analysis will identify when, how and why activities affect patient safety and experience. Generating a rich multivoiced understanding of the process will help identify meaningful targets for improvement.

ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION

Ethical approval granted by the Camden & Kings Cross NHS Regional Ethics Committee (21/LO/0459). A patient and public involvement (PPI) coinvestigator, a multiprofessional steering group and a PPI engagement group are working with the research team. Dissemination of findings is planned through peer-reviewed publications and a stakeholder (policymakers, commissioners, clinicians, researchers, public) report/dissemination event.

Understanding doctors' emergency department antibiotic prescribing decisions in children with respiratory symptoms in the UK: a qualitative study

OBJECTIVE

Exploration of the factors that influence hospital doctors' antibiotic prescribing decisions when treating children with respiratory symptoms in UK emergency departments.

METHODS

A qualitative study using semistructured interviews based on a critical incident technique with 21 physicians of different grades and specialties that treat children in the UK. Interviews were audio-recorded then transcribed verbatim and analysed using thematic analysis.

RESULTS

Four themes were identified. These themes illustrate factors which influence clinician prescribing. The three principal themes were authorities, pressures and risk. The fourth transcending theme that ran through all themes was clinician awareness and complicity ('knowing but still doing').

CONCLUSIONS

Hospital doctors prescribe antibiotics even when they know they should not. This appears to be due to the influence of those in charge or external pressures experienced while weighing up the immediate and longer term risks but clinicians do this with full insight into their actions. These findings have implications for invested parties seeking to develop future antimicrobial stewardship programmes. It is recommended that stewardship interventions acknowledge and target these themes which may in turn facilitate behaviour change and antimicrobial prescribing practice in emergency departments.

A theory-based exploration of antibiotic use in primary healthcare in Gezira state, Sudan

BACKGROUND

Inappropriate use of antibiotics is a major contributing factor to the emergence of antimicrobial resistance globally, including in Sudan.

OBJECTIVES

The project aimed to develop a theory-driven behaviour change strategy addressing both prescribers and patients based on factors that are driving antibiotic use in primary healthcare settings in Gezira state in Sudan.

METHODS

The strategy was designed based on the Theoretical Domains Framework (TDF) to identify behavioural domains and the Behaviour Change Wheel (BCW) to select appropriate intervention functions. The process included (1) a formative qualitative research study and (2) a knowledge co-production workshop that utilized the results of the qualitative study to design a salient, appropriate, and credible behaviour change strategy.

RESULTS

The TDF domains related to prescribers that emerged from the study included knowledge, skills, and intention. The selected BCW intervention functions included education, training, modelling, and persuasion. The main TDF domains related to patients included social influences and intention. The selected BCW intervention functions included enablement and education.

CONCLUSION

Using the TDF and BCW intervention functions, the study identified behavioural domains that influence antibiotic prescription and consumption in rural primary healthcare settings in Gezira state in Sudan and appropriate intervention functions to modify these behaviours. Knowledge co-production ensured that the evidence-based strategy was acceptable and practical in the local context.

Institutional governance and responsiveness to antimicrobial resistance: a qualitative study of Australian hospital executives

OBJECTIVES

Despite escalating antimicrobial resistance (AMR), implementing effective antimicrobial optimisation within healthcare settings has been hampered by institutional impediments. This study sought to examine, from a hospital management and governance perspective, why healthcare providers may find it challenging to enact changes needed to address rising AMR.

DESIGN

Semistructured qualitative interviews around their experiences of antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) and responsiveness to the requirement for optimisation. Data were analysed using the framework approach.

SETTING

Two metropolitan tertiary-referral hospitals in Australia.

PARTICIPANTS

Twenty hospital managers and executives from the organisational level of department head and above, spanning a range of professional backgrounds and in both clinical and non-clinical roles, and different professional streams were represented.

RESULTS

Thematic analysis demonstrated three key domains which managers and executives describe, and which might function to delimit institutional responsiveness to present and future AMR solutions. First, the primacy of 'political' priorities. AMR was perceived as a secondary priority, overshadowed by political priorities determined beyond the hospital by state health departments/ministries and election cycles. Second, the limits of accreditation as a mechanism for change. Hospital accreditation processes and regulatory structures were not sufficient to induce efficacious AMS. Third, a culture of acute problem 'solving' rather than future proofing. A culture of reactivity was described across government and healthcare institutions, precluding longer term objectives, like addressing the AMR crisis.

CONCLUSION

There are dynamics between political and health service institutions, as well as enduring governance norms, that may significantly shape capacity to enact AMS and respond to AMR. Until these issues are addressed, and the field moves beyond individual behaviour modification models, antimicrobial misuse will likely continue, and stewardship is likely to have a limited impact.

Resistant bugs, porous borders and ecologies of care in India

As social science scholarship has routinely illustrated, professional practice is rarely as contained or coherent as it is often imagined to be. The increasing emphasis on the rise of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) has drawn renewed attention to the interconnectedness of clinic, community, environment and planet, and how proposed 'solutions' to major problems such as AMR require a broad, cross-cutting lens. In this study, set in Hyderabad, India, we draw on a series of interviews with hospital-based clinicians completed during 2019 and early 2020, to unpack the multidimensional, ecological acceleration of AMR and the implications for everyday practice. Their accounts make visible how practice operates in relation to industrial economies, community vulnerabilities, and ecologies. This in turn highlights the problem of epistemic bordering, where 'sites' of AMR are targeted but are prone to leakage and transgressions. We propose an ecological approach to conceptualising antimicrobial practices with implications for AMR interventions being rolled out in the sub-continent and beyond.

Combining stool and stories: exploring antimicrobial resistance among a longitudinal cohort of international health students

BACKGROUND

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a global public health concern that requires transdisciplinary and bio-social approaches. Despite the continuous calls for a transdisciplinary understanding of this problem, there is still a lack of such studies. While microbiology generates knowledge about the biomedical nature of bacteria, social science explores various social practices related to the acquisition and spread of these bacteria. However, the two fields remain disconnected in both methodological and conceptual levels. Focusing on the acquisition of multidrug resistance genes, encoding extended-spectrum betalactamases (CTX-M) and carbapenemases (NDM-1) among a travelling population of health students, this article proposes a methodology of 'stool and stories' that combines methods of microbiology and sociology, thus proposing a way forward to a collaborative understanding of AMR.

METHODS

A longitudinal study with 64 health students travelling to India was conducted in 2017. The study included multiple-choice questionnaires (n = 64); a collection of faecal swabs before travel (T0, n = 45), in the first week in India (T1, n = 44), the second week in India (T2, n = 41); and semi-structured interviews (n = 11). Stool samples were analysed by a targeted metagenomic approach. Data from semi-structured interviews were analysed using the method of thematic analysis.

RESULTS

The incidence of ESBL- and carbapenemase resistance genes significantly increased during travel indicating it as a potential risk; for CTX-M from 11% before travel to 78% during travel and for NDM-1 from 2% before travel to 11% during travel. The data from semi-structured interviews showed that participants considered AMR mainly in relation to individual antibiotic use or its presence in a clinical environment but not to travelling.

CONCLUSION

The microbiological analysis confirmed previous research showing that international human mobility is a risk factor for AMR acquisition. However, sociological methods demonstrated that travellers understand AMR primarily as a clinical problem and do not connect it to travelling. These findings indicate an important gap in understanding AMR as a bio-social problem raising a question about the potential effectiveness of biologically driven AMR stewardship programs among travellers. Further development of the 'stool and stories' approach is important for a transdisciplinary basis of AMR stewardship.

Perioperative antimicrobial decision making: Focused ethnography study in orthopedic and cardiothoracic surgeries in an Australian hospital

OBJECTIVE

Antimicrobial use in the surgical setting is common and frequently inappropriate. Understanding the behavioral context of antimicrobial use is a critical step to developing stewardship programs.

DESIGN

In this study, we employed qualitative methodologies to describe the phenomenon of antimicrobial use in 2 surgical units: orthopedic surgery and cardiothoracic surgery.

SETTING

This study was conducted at a public, quaternary, university-affiliated hospital.

PARTICIPANTS

Healthcare professionals from the 2 surgical unit teams participated in the study.

METHODS

We used focused ethnographic and face-to-face semi-structured interviews to observe antimicrobial decision-making behaviors across the patient's journey from the preadmission clinic to the operating room to the postoperative ward.

RESULTS

We identified 4 key themes influencing decision making in the surgical setting. Compartmentalized communication (theme 1) was observed with demarcated roles and defined pathways for communication (theme 2). Antimicrobial decisions in the operating room were driven by the most senior members of the team. These decisions, however, were delegated to more junior members of staff in the ward and clinic environment (theme 3). Throughout the patient's journey, communication with the patient about antimicrobial use was limited (theme 4).

CONCLUSIONS

Approaches to decision making in surgery are highly structured. Although this structure appears to facilitate smooth flow of responsibility, more junior members of the staff may be disempowered. In addition, opportunities for shared decision making with patients were limited. Antimicrobial stewardship programs need to recognize the hierarchal structure as well as opportunities to engage the patient in shared decision making.

The modern hospital executive, micro improvements, and the rise of antimicrobial resistance

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is now recognised as a social, cultural, economic and political phenomenon, positioning the social sciences as central in responding to this global health threat. Yet efforts to address AMR within hospital settings, for example through antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) programs, continue to focus primarily on the prescribing practices of individual clinicians, often with little effect. There has been less attention to the role of healthcare administration, and managerialism therein, in explaining the limited progress to date in reining in antimicrobial misuse. To explore this, drawing on interviews with senior executives and managers from two Australian hospitals, we examine how these stakeholders navigate between management practice and AMR solutions, revealing that antimicrobial optimisation is frequently obscured by accountability structures attuned to other agendas. This has led, we argue, to the institutionalisation of micro-improvements that frequently 'tick the box' of having an AMS program, yet do little to effectively counteract rising AMR. Our analysis illustrates how sociological attention to the structural and ideological settings within which prescribing behaviour is carried out will be crucial to any attempts to successfully rein in AMR.

Understanding the complexities of antibiotic prescribing behaviour in acute hospitals: a systematic review and meta-ethnography

BACKGROUND

Antimicrobial resistance poses a serious global public health threat. Hospital misuse of antibiotics has contributed to this problem and evidence-based interventions are urgently needed to change inappropriate prescribing practices. This paper reports the first theoretical stage of a longer-term project to improve antibiotic prescribing in hospitals through design of an effective behaviour-change intervention.

METHODS

Qualitative synthesis using meta-ethnography of primary studies reporting doctors' views and experiences of antibiotic prescribing in hospitals for example, their barriers to appropriate prescribing. Twenty electronic databases were systematically searched over a 10-year period and potential studies screened against eligibility criteria. Included studies were quality-appraised. Original participant quotes and author interpretations were extracted and coded thematically into NVivo. All study processes were conducted by two reviewers working independently with findings discussed with the wider team and key stakeholders. Studies were related by findings into clusters and translated reciprocally and refutationally to develop a new line-of-argument synthesis and conceptual model. Findings are reported using eMERGe guidance.

RESULTS

Fifteen papers (13 studies) conducted between 2007 and 2017 reporting the experiences of 336 doctors of varying seniority working in acute hospitals across seven countries, were synthesised. Study findings related in four ways which collectively represented multiple challenges to appropriate antibiotic medical prescribing in hospitals: loss of ownership of prescribing decisions, tension between individual care and public health concerns, evidence-based practice versus bedside medicine, and diverse priorities between different clinical teams. The resulting new line-of-argument and conceptual model reflected how these challenges operated on both micro- and macro-level, highlighting key areas for improving current prescribing practice, such as creating feedback mechanisms, normalising input from other specialties and reducing variation in responsibility for antibiotic decisions.

CONCLUSIONS

This first meta-ethnography of doctors` experiences of antibiotic prescribing in acute hospital settings has enabled development of a novel conceptual model enhancing understanding of appropriate antibiotic prescribing. That is, hospital antibiotic prescribing is a complex, context-dependent and dynamic process, entailing the balancing of many tensions. To change practice, comprehensive efforts are needed to manage failures in communication and information provision, promote distribution of responsibility for antibiotic decisions, and reduce fear of consequences from not prescribing.

TRIAL REGISTRATION

PROSPERO registration: CRD42017073740 .

A behavioural approach to specifying interventions: what insights can be gained for the reporting and implementation of interventions to reduce antibiotic use in hospitals?

Background

Reducing unnecessary antibiotic exposure is a key strategy in reducing the development and selection of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Hospital antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) interventions are inherently complex, often requiring multiple healthcare professionals to change multiple behaviours at multiple timepoints along the care pathway. Inaction can arise when roles and responsibilities are unclear. A behavioural perspective can offer insights to maximize the chances of successful implementation.

Objectives

To apply a behavioural framework [the Target Action Context Timing Actors (TACTA) framework] to existing evidence about hospital AMS interventions to specify which key behavioural aspects of interventions are detailed.

Methods

Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and interrupted time series (ITS) studies with a focus on reducing unnecessary exposure to antibiotics were identified from the most recent Cochrane review of interventions to improve hospital AMS. The TACTA framework was applied to published intervention reports to assess the extent to which key details were reported about what behaviour should be performed, who is responsible for doing it and when, where, how often and with whom it should be performed.

Results

The included studies (n = 45; 31 RCTs and 14 ITS studies with 49 outcome measures) reported what should be done, where and to whom. However, key details were missing about who should act (45%) and when (22%). Specification of who should act was missing in 79% of 15 interventions to reduce duration of treatment in continuing-care wards.

Conclusions

The lack of precise specification within AMS interventions limits the generalizability and reproducibility of evidence, hampering efforts to implement AMS interventions in practice.

Antibiotic appropriateness and guideline adherence in hospitalized children: results of a nationwide study

BACKGROUND

Information on the nature and appropriateness of antibiotic prescribing for children in hospitals is important, but scarce.

OBJECTIVES

To analyse antimicrobial prescribing and appropriateness, and guideline adherence, in hospitalized children across Australia.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

We analysed data from the National Antimicrobial Prescribing Survey (NAPS) from 2014 to 2017. Surveys were performed in hospital facilities of all types (public and private; major city, regional and remote). Participants were admitted children <18 years old. Risk factors associated with inappropriate prescribing were explored using logistic regression models.

RESULTS

Among 6219 prescriptions for 3715 children in 253 facilities, 19.6% of prescriptions were deemed inappropriate. Risk factors for inappropriate prescribing included non-tertiary paediatric hospital admission [OR 1.37 (95% CI 1.20-1.55)] and non-major city hospital location [OR 1.52 (95% CI 1.30-1.77)]. Prescriptions for neonates, immunocompromised children and those admitted to an ICU were less frequently inappropriate. If a restricted antimicrobial was prescribed and not approved, the prescription was more likely to be inappropriate [OR 12.9 (95% CI 8.4-19.8)]. Surgical prophylaxis was inappropriate in 59% of prescriptions.

CONCLUSIONS

Inappropriate antimicrobial prescribing in children was linked to specific risk factors identified here, presenting opportunities for targeted interventions to improve prescribing. This information, using a NAPS dataset, allows for analysis of antimicrobial prescribing among different groups of hospitalized children. Further exploration of barriers to appropriate prescribing and facilitators of best practice in this population is recommended.

Safety of reducing antibiotic prescribing in primary care: a mixed-methods study

Background

The threat of antimicrobial resistance has led to intensified efforts to reduce antibiotic utilisation, but serious bacterial infections are increasing in frequency.

Objectives

To estimate the risks of serious bacterial infections in association with lower antibiotic prescribing and understand stakeholder views with respect to safe antibiotic reduction.

Design

Mixed-methods research was undertaken, including a qualitative interview study of patient and prescriber views that informed a cohort study and a decision-analytic model, using primary care electronic health records. These three work packages were used to design an application (app) for primary care prescribers.

Data sources

The Clinical Practice Research Datalink.

Setting

This took place in UK general practices.

Participants

A total of 706 general practices with 66.2 million person-years of follow-up from 2002 to 2017 and antibiotic utilisation evaluated for 671,830 registered patients. The qualitative study included 31 patients and 30 health-care professionals from primary care.

Main outcome measures

Sepsis and localised bacterial infections.

Results

Patients were concerned about antimicrobial resistance and the side effects, as well as the benefits, of antibiotic treatment. Prescribers viewed the onset of sepsis as the most concerning potential outcome of reduced antibiotic prescribing. More than 40% of antibiotic prescriptions in primary care had no coded indication recorded across both Vision® and EMIS® practice systems. Antibiotic prescribing rates varied widely between general practices, but there was no evidence that serious bacterial infections were less frequent at higher prescribing practices (adjusted rate ratio for 20% increase in prescribing 1.03, 95% confidence interval 1.00 to 1.06; p = 0.074). The probability of sepsis was lower if an antibiotic was prescribed at an infection consultation, and the number of antibiotic prescriptions required to prevent one episode of sepsis (i.e. the number needed to treat) decreased with age. For those aged 0–4 years, the number needed to treat was 29,773 (95% uncertainty interval 18,458 to 71,091) in boys and 27,014 (95% uncertainty interval 16,739 to 65,709) in girls. For those aged > 85 years, the number needed to treat was 262 (95% uncertainty interval 236 to 293) in men and 385 (95% uncertainty interval 352 to 421) in women. Frailty was associated with a greater risk of sepsis and a smaller number needed to treat. For severely frail patients aged 55–64 years, the number needed to treat was 247 (95% uncertainty interval 156 to 459) for men and 343 (95% uncertainty interval 234 to 556) for women. At all ages, the probability of sepsis was greatest for urinary tract infection, followed by skin infection and respiratory tract infection. The numbers needed to treat were generally smaller for the period 2014–17, when sepsis was diagnosed more frequently. The results are available using an app that we developed to provide primary care prescribers with stratified risk estimates during infection consultations.

Limitations

Analyses were based on non-randomised comparisons. Infection episodes and antibiotic prescribing are poorly documented in primary care.

Conclusions

Antibiotic treatment is generally associated with lower risks, but the most serious bacterial infections remain infrequent even without antibiotic treatment. This research identifies risk strata in which antibiotic prescribing can be more safely reduced.

Future work

The software developed from this research may be further developed and investigated for antimicrobial stewardship effect.

Funding

This project was funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Services and Delivery Research programme and will be published in full in Health Services and Delivery Research; Vol. 9, No. 9. See the NIHR Journals Library website for further project information.

What are the challenges for antibiotic stewardship at the community level? An analysis of the drivers of antibiotic provision by informal healthcare providers in rural India

In many low- and middle-income countries, providers without formal training are an important source of antibiotics, but may provide these inappropriately, contributing to the rising burden of drug resistant infections. Informal providers (IPs) who practise allopathic medicine are part of India's pluralistic health system legacy. They outnumber formal providers but operate in a policy environment of unclear legitimacy, creating unique challenges for antibiotic stewardship. Using a systems approach we analysed the multiple intrinsic (provider specific) and extrinsic (community, health and regulatory system and pharmaceutical industry) drivers of antibiotic provision by IPs in rural West Bengal, to inform the design of community stewardship interventions. We surveyed 291 IPs in randomly selected village clusters in two contrasting districts and conducted in-depth interviews with 30 IPs and 17 key informants including pharmaceutical sales representatives, managers and wholesalers/retailers; medically qualified private and public doctors and health and regulatory officials. Eight focus group discussions were conducted with community members. We found a mosaic or bricolage of informal practices conducted by IPs, qualified doctors and industry stakeholders that sustained private enterprise and supplemented the weak public health sector. IPs' intrinsic drivers included misconceptions about the therapeutic necessity of antibiotics, and direct and indirect economic benefits, though antibiotics were not the most profitable category of drug sales. Private doctors were a key source of IPs' learning, often in exchange for referrals. IPs constituted a substantial market for local and global pharmaceutical companies that adopted aggressive business strategies to exploit less-saturated rural markets. Paradoxically, the top-down nature of regulations produced a regulatory impasse wherein regulators were reluctant to enforce heavy sanctions for illegal sales, fearing an adverse impact on rural healthcare, but could not implement enabling strategies to improve antibiotic provision due to legal barriers. We discuss the implications for a multi-stakeholder antibiotic stewardship strategy in this setting.

Are systemic antibiotics indicated in children presenting with an odontogenic abscess in the primary dentition? A systematic review of the literature

OBJECTIVES

This systematic review aimed to assess (1) whether systemic antibiotics are beneficial or harmful in healthy children who present with an odontogenic abscess in the primary dentition with or without systemic involvement and (2) if antibiotics are beneficial, which type, dosage and duration are the most effective.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Electronic databases (Medline, Embase, and the Cochrane Library) were screened from 1948 up to August 2020. No filters with respect to study design were applied. Outcomes of interest included pain, swelling, pain relief, adverse effects, signs of infection, quality-of-life measurements and medication required for pain relief.

RESULTS

Altogether, 352 titles and abstracts were screened for eligibility; of these, 19 were selected for full text assessment. All were excluded because none of them fulfilled the inclusion criteria and addressed the (adjunctive) use of antibiotics in children who present with an odontogenic abscess in the primary dentition.

CONCLUSIONS

At present, there is no single randomised or non-randomised clinical study evaluating the effectiveness and harms of systemic antibiotics administered in children who present with an odontogenic abscess in the primary dentition.

CLINICAL RELEVANCE

There is no clinical evidence to support nor to refute the use of antibiotics in children who present with an odontogenic abscess in the primary dentition without signs of local spread or systemic involvement. Given this lack of scientific evidence, the use of antibiotics cannot be recommended in these children. Well-designed clinical trials are indicated to fully understand the impact and necessity of antibiotics in these situations.

Exploring Physicians' Views, Perceptions and Experiences about Broad-Spectrum Antimicrobial Prescribing in a Tertiary Care Hospital Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: A Qualitative Approach

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a global public health threat associated with increased mortality, morbidity and costs. Inappropriate antimicrobial prescribing, particularly of broad-spectrums antimicrobials (BSAs), is considered a major factor behind growing AMR. The aim of this study was to explore physician perception and views about BSAs and factors that impact upon their BSAs prescribing decisions. Qualitative semistructured telephone interviews over an eleven-week period were conducted with physicians in a single tertiary care hospital in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Purposeful and snowball sampling techniques were adopted as sampling strategy. All interviews were audio recorded, transcribed verbatim, uploaded to NVivo^® software and analysed following thematic analysis approach. Four major themes emerged: views on BSAs, factors influencing BSA prescribing and antimicrobial stewardship: practices and barriers and recommendations to improve appropriate BSA prescribing. Recommendations for the future include improving clinical knowledge, feedback on prescribing, multidisciplinary team decision-making and local guideline implementation. Identification of views and determinants of BSA prescribing can guide the design of a multifaceted intervention to support physicians and policymakers to improve antimicrobial prescribing practices.

Understanding farmers' and veterinarians' behavior in relation to antimicrobial use and resistance in dairy cattle: A systematic review

To tackle antimicrobial resistance, it is vital that farmers' and veterinarians' antimicrobial use behaviors and attitudes toward resistance are understood so that we can identify how beliefs and motives influence practices. Current literature details qualitative and quantitative research that explores the knowledge, attitudes and perceptions of dairy farmers and veterinarians with respect to antimicrobial resistance and antimicrobial practices, and the reported findings are varied and conflicting. Our objective was to conduct a systematic review to assess the evidence and knowledge gaps in the published literature. We identified articles via database searches of Embase, Medline, PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science; we limited findings to published articles available in English with no publication year restrictions. Article screening was conducted at 3 levels: title, abstract, and full text. Of the 349 articles identified, 35 were retained for systematic review. Transparency of reporting was assessed for each study using the Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research (COREQ) framework. Quality was assessed using the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme qualitative checklist. Findings relating to dairy farmers' and veterinarians' knowledge, attitudes, and perceptions on antimicrobial resistance and practices were thematically analyzed. The comprehensiveness of reporting was variable: studies reported 5 to 26 of the 32 COREQ checklist items. Five key themes emerged from the data: knowledge and awareness of antimicrobial resistance; factors influencing farmer and veterinarian decision-making; perceived barriers and facilitators to reduced antimicrobial use; perceived responsibility for antimicrobial resistance; and the role of the farmer and veterinarian relationship in reducing antimicrobial use. Awareness of prudent antimicrobial use was not uniform between studies. Many factors influence farmers' and veterinarians' decisions to use antimicrobials, including animal welfare and available resources. The farmer-veterinarian relationship is a potential barrier or facilitator of reduced antimicrobial use, depending on the perceived relationship dynamic. Encouraging collaboration between farmers and veterinarians could lead to shared responsibility for reducing antimicrobial use. This review provided a coherent picture of what is currently known and identified gaps in the current knowledge to inform future behavioral intervention research. Increased knowledge, skill development, resources, engagement, and further research to address the gaps we identified are the main recommendations to effectively overcome barriers, elicit appropriate behavior change, and achieve reduced antimicrobial use in dairy cattle.

Factors influencing antimicrobial prescription attitudes in bloodstream infections: susceptibility results and beyond. An exploratory survey

BACKGROUND

Novel rapid antimicrobial susceptibility testing (RAST) methods promise quicker de-escalation of broad-spectrum antibiotics. However, other behavioural and situational factors influencing antimicrobial prescription are not well known.

AIM

To explore factors associated with optimal antimicrobial prescription in patients with Gram-negative bloodstream infection and to propose specific scenarios in which a rapid antimicrobial susceptibility result may help to optimize prescribing.

METHODS

Exploratory survey (April-August 2018) in the UK and Spain using clinical case-related questions. Seniority, specialty and country of practice were recorded. Cases described patients with Gram-negative bloodstream infections, their empirical treatment and clinical course and the hypothetical RAST result. Respondents chose one of several options regarding antibiotic treatment management. Microbiologically optimal antibiotic choice (MOAC) was agreed by expert consensus beforehand. Responses were categorized as MOAC, request for support or sub-optimal choice. The relationship between the RAST result and the clinical course was defined as concordant (susceptible organism-clinical improvement; resistant organism-clinical deterioration) or as discordant otherwise.

FINDINGS

A total of 426 respondents (UK: 332; Spain: 94) and 1494 answers were analysed. Multivariate analysis identified that requests for support were 87% less likely in Spain; that antimicrobial resistance and clinical deterioration were associated with both increased request for support (odds ratio (OR) 7.66 and OR 4.26, respectively) and MOAC (OR 2.08 and OR 2.06, respectively). A discordant clinical course was associated with 82% lower odds for MOAC. Out-of-hours results, seniority and specialty did not have an effect.

CONCLUSION

Antimicrobial choice is influenced by each country's type of practice, clinical course and susceptibility results. Antimicrobial resistance was associated with increased optimal treatment, suggesting RAST may be less useful for step-down decisions in settings with low baseline resistance rates.

Veterinary Herd Health Consultancy and Antimicrobial Use in Dairy Herds

The globally increasing level of antimicrobial resistance affects both human and animal health, why it is necessary to identify ways to change our current use of antimicrobials. The veterinary herd health collaboration between veterinarians and dairy farmers provides a useful setting for changing antimicrobial use in livestock. However, farmers and veterinarians work in a complex agricultural setting influenced by socio-economic factors, which complicates their choices regarding antimicrobial usage. It is therefore necessary to be aware of the range of potential influencing factors and to integrate this knowledge in the relevant local settings. This manuscript presents a literature review of relevant factors relating to antimicrobial use within the veterinary herd health consultancy setting, including knowledge gaps of relevance for changing the use of antimicrobials. An enriched version of the framework of the Theory of Planned Behaviour was used to organise the literature review. We identified diverging attitudes on correct treatment practices and perceptions of antimicrobial resistance among veterinarians and farmers, influenced by individual risk perception as well as social norms. Furthermore, disagreements in terms of goal setting and in the frequency of herd visits in relation to herd health consultancy can negatively influence the collaboration and the intention to change antimicrobial use. Farmers and veterinarians emphasise the importance of legislation and the role of the dairy industry in changing antimicrobial use, but the relevance of specific factors depends on the country-specific context. Overall, farmers and veterinarians must communicate better to understand each other's perspectives and establish common goals within the collaboration if they are to work efficiently to reduce antimicrobial use. Farmers and veterinarians both requested changes in individual behaviour; however, they also called for national and structural solutions in terms of balanced legislation and the availability of better diagnostics to facilitate a change in antimicrobial use practices. These various paths to achieving the desired changes in antimicrobial use illustrate the need to bridge methodological research approaches of veterinary science and social sciences for a better understanding of our potential to change antimicrobial use within the dairy farm animal sector.

Obligatory medical prescription of antibiotics in Russia: Navigating formal and informal health-care infrastructures

Antimicrobial resistance control programmes often aim to "fix" the behaviour of antibiotic users and prescribers. Such behavioural interventions have been widely criticised in social science literature for being inefficient and too narrow in scope. Drawing on these criticisms, this article analyses how political programmes for fixing antibiotic behaviours were adapted into the practices of health-care professionals and patients in Russia. In 2018, we conducted interviews with medical doctors, pharmacists and patients in a Russian city; focusing on their practices around the policy requirement introduced in 2017 which obligated medical prescriptions of antibiotics. We conceptualised the obligatory medical prescription as a political technique which sought to change practices of self-treatment and over-the-counter sales of medications by establishing doctors as an obligatory passage point to access antibiotics. Our analysis shows that the requirement for medical prescriptions does not fulfil the infrastructural gaps that influence antibiotic practices. By navigating the antibiotic prescriptions, doctors, pharmacists and patients informally compensate for the gaps in the existing infrastructure creating informal networks of antibiotic care parallel to the requirement of obligatory prescriptions. Following these informal practices, we could map the inconsistencies in the current policy approaches to tackle AMR as a behavioural rather than infrastructural problem.

Evaluating the impact of a pharmacist-led prescribing feedback intervention on prescribing errors in a hospital setting

BACKGROUND

Prescribing errors are prevalent in hospital settings with provision of feedback recommended to support prescribing of doctors. Feedback on prescribing has been described as feasible and valued but limited by doctors, with pharmacists described as credible facilitators of prescribing feedback. Evidence supporting prescribing feedback has been limited to date. A formalised programme of pharmacist-led prescribing error feedback was designed and implemented to support prescribers.

OBJECTIVE

To evaluate the impact of a prescribing feedback intervention on prescribing error rates and frequency of prescribing error severity and type.

METHOD

Prospective prescribing audits were undertaken across sixteen hospital wards in a UK teaching hospital over a five day period with 36 prescribers in the intervention group and 41 in the control group. The intervention group received pharmacist-led, individualised constructive feedback on their prescribing, whilst the control group continued with existing practice. Prescribing was re-audited after three months. Prescribing errors were classified by type and severity and data were analysed using relevant statistical tests.

RESULTS

A total of 5191 prescribed medications were audited at baseline and 5122 post-intervention. There was a mean prescribing error rate of 25.0% (SD 16.8, 95% CI 19.3 to 30.7) at baseline and 6.7% (SD 9.0, 95% CI 3.7 to 9.8) post-intervention for the intervention group, and 19.7% (SD 14.5, 95% CI 15.2 to 24.3) at baseline and 25.1% (SD 17.0, 95% CI 19.8 to 30.6) post-intervention for the control group with a significant overall change in prescribing error rates between groups of 23.7% (SD 3.5, 95% CI, -30.6 to -16.8), t(75) = -6.9, p < 0.05. The frequency of each error type and severity rating was reduced in the intervention group, whilst the error frequency of some error types and severity increased in the control group.

CONCLUSION

Pharmacist-led prescribing feedback has the potential to reduce prescribing errors and improve prescribing outcomes and patient safety.

Antimicrobial overuse in India: A symptom of broader societal issues including resource limitations and financial pressures

India and the global community are facing a critical crisis of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), significantly contributed to by on-going and increasing antimicrobial misuse. Information as to what drives misuse of antimicrobials within India is essential to inform strategies to address the crisis. This papers aims to identify perceived influences on antimicrobial use in Hyderabad, India. We conducted semi-structured qualitative interviews conducted with thirty participants (15 doctors, 15 pharmacists) around their experiences of antimicrobials in Hyderabad, India. Thematic analysis was performed and four themes identified around (1) Perceptions of the problem of resistance and antimicrobial use; (2) Social pressures to prescribe/dispense; (3) Financial pressures driving antimicrobial over-use; and (4) Lack of regulation around training and qualifications. We conclude that antimicrobial use within India is embedded with, and occurs as a result of, complex social and economic factors including issues of resource limitation, structural/governance limitations and social relationships. Strategies to address misuse without acknowledging and addressing the critical driving forces of use will be unlikely to induce significant change.

A decade of antimicrobial resistance research in social science fields: a scientometric review

Background

Though social sciences are expectedly instrumental in combating antimicrobial resistance (AMR), their research on AMR has been historically lacking.

Objectives

This study aims to understand the current academic literature on AMR within the social science field by investigating international contributions, emerging topics, influential articles, and prominent outlets, to identify research gaps and future directions.

Methods

Bibliometric data of 787 peer-reviewed journal articles published in the period of 2010 to 2019 were extracted from the Social Science Citation Index in the Web of Science database. Bibliographic networks of the extracted articles were examined.

Results

Social science research on AMR has grown rapidly in the past 5 years. While western developed countries contributed the most to the field in the past decade, research within developing regions such as Asia and Africa have increased in the last 2 years. Social sciences have been contributing to AMR research in several different domains from surveillance and risk assessment of AMR, to promotions of appropriate use of antimicrobials in primary care and clinical settings. Though the idea of one health has been incorporated into research on AMR within the medical and microbial science fields, it has not been well recognized by social sciences.

Conclusion

Social science research on AMR is a new, while rapidly developing, research area that requires continued and intense global efforts from an interdisciplinary and one health approach. Research on social issues surrounding AMR transmissions between human, animal, and environments should be emphasized in the future.