Pharmacists must help conserve antibiotics

摘要

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) continues to be a growing threat to public health worldwide. It is the responsibility of all healthcare professionals to address the misuse of antibiotics. And yet GPs in the UK are ever more likely to prescribe antibiotics for coughs and colds, sore throat, coughs and otitis media; indeed between 1999 and 2011, GPs were 40% more likely to do so, according to a study in the Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy (online, 4 August 2014). Community pharmacists should take advantage of their accessibility to patients in the community by advising patients not to request antibiotics from their GPs for such self-limiting infections and help play their part in a concerted effort to reduce the rise of antibiotic resistance.