A Cohort Study on Anti-microbial Stewardship in PICU

Appropriate antimicrobial therapy is essential to ensuring positive patient outcomes. Inappropriate or suboptimal utilization of antibiotics can lead to increased length of stay, multidrug-resistant infections, and mortality. Critically ill intensive care patients are at risk of antibiotic failure and secondary infections associated with incorrect antibiotic use. Initiating effective therapy for infections based upon patients' risk factors, collection of appropriate cultures, daily evaluation of clinical status, and laboratory data, including antibiotic time outs, and shortened duration of therapy are ways to improve patients outcomes. Antimicrobial stewardship teams can assist ICU providers in managing and implementing these tactics. ICUs would benefit from employing empiric guidelines for antibiotic use, collecting appropriate specimens and implementing molecular diagnostics, optimizing the dosing of antibiotics, and reducing the duration of total therapy.