Are you taking the lead?

摘要

Doctors should be leaders and leadership in the area of appropriate antibiotic usage and control of infection is of central importance to patients and to all our practices.You do not have to work in a hospital to know the importance of infections such as Clostridium difficile or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). Simply open the newspapers and scare stories abound. A recent survey revealed that one of the greatest concerns of patients going into hospital was that they might catch an infection. Our responsibility as clinicians is to reduce the incidence of infection as much as possible and ensure best practice is in place. Then we must communicate to the public exactly what is going on and what can realistically be expected. Infections cannot be eliminated from clinical practice but do the public appreciate this? Bacteria such as MRSA circulate and can cause clinically significant infections in the community but this too often is not appreciated. So how do we go about being leaders, improving outcome and instilling confidence in patients?