Software Dashboard Improves Antibiotic Stewardship

A new tool allows pharmacists to quickly analyze antibiotic use trends and determine opportunities to enhance antibiotic stewardship efforts.

The Antibiotic Analytics dashboard tracks and benchmarks antibiotic selection and use over time, by defined daily dose or days of therapy. It then evaluates susceptibility and resistance patterns, and determines the best pharmaceutical agent for each hospital's specific patient population. In addition to supporting current antibiotic stewardship programs, the software tool also provides health-system level reporting, identifies intra-venous (IV) to per-os (PO) comparisons for benchmarking, and integrates antibiograms with antibiotic use trending.

The dashboard also allows users to switch between diagnosis-related group (DRG) and prescribing physician information from antibiotic trending data. The Antibiotic Analytics dashboard was developed by Cardinal Health (Dublin, OH, USA), and is part of its Drug Cost Opportunity Analytics software package, a web-based technology that provides data and insights to help hospital pharmacy leaders manage drug spending.

“From CDC initiatives to White House executive orders, antibiotic resistance is a growing concern for hospitals and health systems, nationwide, making antibiotic stewardship top-of-mind for many pharmacy leaders,” said Tom Burke, innovative delivery solutions business general manager at Cardinal Health. “This new tool provides pharmacists with the actionable insight they need to develop proactive antibiotic stewardship programs, measure and continually improve them—all in an effort to improve patient safety and reduce unnecessary healthcare costs.”

Approximately two million people suffer from antibiotic-resistant infections annually, which result in 23,000 deaths. Major drivers of resistance include self-medication, noncompliance, misinformation, advertising pressures, ignorance, lack of education, and lack of access to healthcare. The problem is complicated by economic and social barriers to rational use of drugs, even in hospitals. Cardinal said it observed that up to 50% of antibiotic use in hospitals is inappropriate.

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