A platform to monitor antibiotic consumption in Spanish hospitals
New EFSA recommendations
September 14, 2022
Word Antimicrobial Awareness week
November 22, 2022
The appearance of antimicrobial resistant microorganisms is the cause for infectious diseases, which we used to have under control, to start having a more difficult management.
A strategy based on the registration and control of antibiotics in the hospital environment is a fundamental tool in order to act collectively towards a global problem
The “Monitoring of the antibiotics consumption in Spain Platform” was presented last 21st of September in Madrid at the AEMPS (the Spanish Medicines and Sanitary Products Agency) headquarters, as the result of the collective work of the PRAN (National Plan Against Antibiotic Resistance) and the SEFH (Spanish Society of Hospital Pharmacies).
Dr. Mª Jesús Lamas, director of the AEMPS, has highlighted that “monitoring antibiotic consumption es key to identify problems associated to its use, to implement improving measures and to evaluate the impact of these measures. This is an essential contribution for the PROA (Programs for the Optimization of Antimicrobials Use) teams and, finally, towards the fight against antibiotic resistance”.
The Chief of the Direction Support Unit from the AEMPS and PRAN Coordinator in the area of human health, Antonio López Navas, has remarqued PRAN’s need of improvement of the antibiotic consumption data collection in hospitals. Therefore, it is mandatory to strengthen the collaboration between the Ministry, the autonomous communities and scientific societies like SEFH.
Dr. Aurora Fernández, from the coordinator group of AFINF (Pharmaceutical Attention in Infectious Diseases Group of the SEFH), stated that the development of this platform is the result of a work of many years from the hospital pharmacies in Spain, as they have collected, analyzed and studied antibiotic consumption. “At AFINF, we saw the need of creating this online platform in order to share all data collected at each hospital and, this way, get to know the use of antibiotics at a national scale and look for global strategies. The appearance of resistant microorganisms is global and requires transversal strategies, as local ones are not enough to tackle this problem”.
“The role of hospital pharmacies and the SFEH in this project in the future – from the point of view of Dr. Jordi Nicolás, vice-president of the SFEH – will be to keep on working and studying new collaborative strategies among the different services of the hospital pharmacies in Spain. But also, among different assistance level (hospital and primary health care), and with other colleagues like infectious diseases medical doctor, care physicians, microbiologists or nurses, etc. For our society it is, without a doubt, an opportunity in order to know the current situation and how different interventions that we perform are impacting the hospital sector”.
Raising of antibiotic resistance
The current context shows a raise of the appearance of microorganisms with antimicrobial resistance, a fact that makes it even more fundamental to know the use of antibiotics that is being done in order to establish improvement actions. It is very important for the citizens that the Hospital Pharmacies Services can report the real consumption of antibiotics in Spain jointly. The unified vision, which allows the Monitoring of the antibiotics consumption in Spain Platform with all Spanish hospitals involved, will enable a global picture at national scale, which will make it possible to improve and optimize this resource, which is getting more and more scarce.
From the AFINF, they highlight that “we are living a very risky moment, as infectious diseases that used to be under our control, and we have been able to treat for the last two decades, are starting to become a challenge with the appearance of resistant microorganisms. It is fundamental to set in motion any strategy in our hands as, in this case, the control on the use of antibiotics in the hospital sector”.
Dr. José María Gutiérrez, from the coordinator group of AFINF, has explained that the platform invites hospitals to include their antibiotic consumption data in a simple, homogenous and anonymous way. This allows the exploitation of their own data and offers a comparative analysis, compared to other hospitals on the same level, of their use pattern based on quality consumption indicators.
About SEFH
The Spanish Society of Hospital Pharmacies (SEFH in Spanish) is a scientific, private, active, professional and non-profit organization. Its goal is to raise awareness on hospital pharmacy and its actions seek to improve results in patients’ health through a correct and safe use of medicines.
About PRAN
The National Plan Against Antibiotic Resistance (PRAN in Spanish) is a strategic and action plan whose goal us to reduce the risk of selection and dissemination of antibiotic resistance. Therefore, reducing the impact of this problem on the health of people, animals and the environment, through the preservation of existent antibiotics’ efficacy in a sustainable way is another priority for PRAN. Currently, all autonomous communities, ten ministries (Health, Consumption, Agriculture, Economy, Education, Science, Universities, Home, Defence and Ecological Transition), over 70 scientific societies, school organizations, professional associations, universities and around 300 expert collaborators participate in the development of this plan.
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This text is translated from the original press release publish on PRAN’s website and the photo that heads this article has been taken from the same post too. You can read the original document here.
