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With growing government investment and a thriving consumer market, digital technologies are rapidly transforming our means of healthcare delivery. These innovations offer increased diagnostic accuracy, greater accessibility and reduced costs compared with conventional equivalents. Despite these benefits, implementing digital health poses challenges. Recent surveys of healthcare professionals (HCPs) have revealed marked inequities in digital literacy across the healthcare service, hampering the use of these new technologies in clinical practice. Furthermore, a lack of appropriate training in the associated ethical considerations risks HCPs running into difficulty when it comes to patient rights. In light of this, and with a clear need for dedicated digital health education, we argue that our focus should turn to the foundation setting of any healthcare profession: the undergraduate curriculum.
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PURPOSE: To provide a guide to interpreting bacterial culture results. METHODS: Studies were identified via a PubMed literature search (from 1966 to January 2018). Search terms included microbial sensitivity tests, microbial drug resistance, and anti-infective agents/pharmacology. Articles were included if they were published in English. References within identified articles were also reviewed. RESULTS: This paper reviewed core concepts of interpreting bacterial culture results, including timing of cultures, common culture sites, potential for contamination, interpreting the Gram stain, role of rapid diagnostic tests, conventional antibiotic susceptibility testing, and automated testing. CONCLUSION: This guide can assist pharmacists in their role as integral members of the antimicrobial stewardship team in an effort to improve patient care.
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STUDY OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the association of the development of acute kidney injury (AKI) when piperacillin-tazobactam is used in combination with vancomycin compared with vancomycin with or without a ß-lactam. DESIGN: Meta-analysis of 15 observational cohort studies. PATIENTS: A total of 3258 adult inpatients who received vancomycin + piperacillin-tazobactam versus vancomycin alone (10 studies); vancomycin + piperacillin-tazobactam versus vancomycin + ß-lactam (four studies); or vancomycin + piperacillin-tazobactam versus vancomycin alone or vancomycin + other antibiotics (one study). MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: The PubMed, Embase, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, and Cochrane databases, as well as meeting proceedings, were searched (1966-June 1, 2016). Quality of studies was assessed by using the Newcastle-Ottawa Quality Assessment Scale (NOQAS). The primary outcome of this meta-analysis was to evaluate the association of development of AKI with the combined use of piperacillin-tazobactam and vancomycin. A subgroup analysis was also performed that examined the outcome by comparison groups (vancomycin alone or vancomycin + ß-lactam). Sensitivity analysis was performed to explore if the results differed based on removal of abstracts and removal of low-quality studies (NOQAS scores of 6 or lower). All analyses were performed using the random effects model. NOQAS scores for the 15 studies ranged from 3-7 points (of a total of 9). Overall, there was an association with the development of AKI with vancomycin + piperacillin-tazobactam compared with vancomycin ± ß-lactam (odds ratio [OR] 3.649, 95% confidence interval [CI] 2.157-6.174; I2 = 83.5%, p<0.001). The association remained significant when abstracts were removed (OR 3.498, 95% CI 1.747-7.003, I2 = 82.3%, p<0.001) and when low-quality studies were removed (OR 4.596, 95% CI 2.929-7.212, I2 = 0%, p<0.001). The association for the development of AKI with vancomycin + piperacillin-tazobactam compared with vancomycin alone was significant (OR 3.980, 95% CI 2.749-5.763, I2 = 31.4%, p<0.001), although the association did not remain significant for the vancomycin + ß-lactam subgroup (OR 3.029, 95% CI 0.942-9.738, I2 = 82.3%, p=0.063). CONCLUSION: Vancomycin + piperacillin-tazobactam was associated with an increased risk of AKI compared with vancomycin ± ß-lactam. Practitioners need to be vigilant about this association when prescribing this combination of antibiotics.