healthleaders: Antibiotic Resistance Impacted by Patient Age and Care Setting, Study Finds

By Christopher Cheney

To reduce antibiotic resistance, hospitals should use care setting-specific antibiotic stewardship programs that are based on the type of facility and patient age, a recently published research article found.

Antimicrobial resistance occurs when germs such as bacteria and fungi develop the ability to be resistant to the drugs that are designed to kill them, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In the United States, there are more than 2.8 million antimicrobial-resistant infections annually that are associated with more than 35,000 deaths, the CDC says.

The recent research article, which was published by JAC-Antimicrobial Resistance, is based on data collected from 166 facilities from 2012 to 2017. The data was separated into four patient groups: children, adults, children treated at standalone pediatric facilities, and children treated at facilities that serve both children and adults.

The results of the research article include a key finding: resistance rates for antibiotics were associated with age and care setting. For example, ertapenem-resistant Enterobacter cloacae in children increased significantly compared with adults, and ertapenem-resistant Enterobacter cloacae among children in pediatric facilities increased significantly compared to facilities that serve both children and adults.

INTERPRETING THE DATA

The research article is based on a powerful set of data, a co-author of the study told HealthLeaders. "It's important to look at this project as using a national dataset. All too often, research involving antibiotic resistance is either a single institution looking within their organization or research that looks at national datasets that do not have this level of detail. So, one of our goals was to evaluate the influence of patient age and care setting on the profile of antibiotic resistance," said Mark Hoffman, PhD, chief research information officer at Kansas City, Missouri-based Children's Mercy Hospital.

Read the full article via healthleaders

Children's Mercy Kansas City Research Institute

Research areas at Children's Mercy Kansas City Research Institute