Assessment of Guideline Discordance With Antimicrobial Prophylaxis Best Practices for Common Urologic Procedures.

Importance: The American Urological Association guidelines recommend 24 or fewer hours of antimicrobial prophylaxis for most urologic procedures. Continuing antimicrobial therapy beyond 24 hours may carry more risks than advantages. Objectives: To assess guideline discordance of antimicrobial prophylaxis for common urologic endoscopic procedures, and to identify opportunities for improving antimicrobial prescribing through future stewardship interventions. Design, Setting, and Participants: This multicenter cohort study conducted manual audits of medical records of 375 patients who underwent 1 of 3 urologic procedures (transurethral resection of bladder tumor [TURBT], transurethral resection of the prostate [TURP], and ureteroscopy [URS]) at 5 Veterans Health Administration facilities from January 1, 2016, to June 30, 2017. Antimicrobial prescribing practices across the national Veterans Health Administration system were assessed using the administrative data for 29 530 records. Main Outcomes and Measures: Guideline discordance was assessed in the medical record review. Excessive postprocedural antimicrobial use was measured in the national administrative data analysis. Results: The medical records of a total of 375 patients were manually reviewed. Among the 375 patients, 366 (97.6%) were male and 9 (2.4%) were female, with a mean (SD) age of 64.2 (10.9) years and a predominantly white race/ethnicity (289 [77.1%]). In addition, 29 530 patient records in the national administrative database were assessed. Among the patient records, 28 938 (98.0%) were male and 592 (2.0%) were female with a mean (SD) age of 69.1 (10.2) years and a predominantly white race/ethnicity (23 297 [78.9%]). Among the manually reviewed medical records, periprocedural or postprocedural antimicrobial prescribing was guideline discordant in 217 patients (57.9%). Postprocedural antimicrobial agents were continued beyond 24 hours in 211 patients (56.3%) and were guideline discordant in 177 patients (83.9%), with a median (interquartile range) duration of 3 (3-5) days of unnecessary antimicrobial therapy. In the analysis of national administrative data, excessive postprocedural antimicrobial agents were prescribed in 10 988 of 29 350 patient records (37.2%), with a median (interquartile range) of 3 (2-6) excess days. For any given facility, a statistically significant correlation was observed in the frequency of postprocedural antimicrobial prescribing between any 2 procedures, indicating that facilities with higher rates of excessive use for 1 procedure also had higher rates for another procedure: TURP and TURBT (ρ = 0.719; 95% CI, 0.603-0.803; P < .001), TURP and URS (ρ = 0.629; 95% CI, 0.476-0.741; P < .001), and TURBT and URS (ρ = 0.813; 95% CI, 0.724-0.873; P < .001). Conclusions and Relevance: In this study of patients who underwent common urologic procedures, the rate of guideline-discordant antimicrobial use was high mostly because of overprescribing of postprocedural antimicrobial agents; future antimicrobial stewardship interventions should target the postprocedural period.

Impact of a multidisciplinary team review of potential outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy prior to discharge from an academic medical center.

BACKGROUND: Outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy (OPAT) is frequently prescribed at hospital discharge, often without infectious diseases (ID) clinician oversight. We developed a multidisciplinary team, including an ID pharmacist, to review OPAT care plans at hospital discharge to improve safety, clinical efficacy, practicality, and appropriateness of the proposed antimicrobial regimen. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the impact of the OPAT team on regimen safety, efficacy, and complexity; calculate the economic benefits of the service by avoiding hospital discharge delay, central venous catheter placement, or need for OPAT; and evaluate the discharge environment among OPAT referrals. METHODS: In an observational design, we analyzed the impact of an OPAT team from July 2009 through June 2010 at a large academic tertiary care hospital. All patients with plans for continued parenteral therapy after discharge referred to the OPAT team were included in the analysis. Patients were excluded if OPAT was cancelled prior to processing of the referral. RESULTS: During the 1-year study period, 569 of 644 consecutive referrals to the OPAT team met inclusion criteria, resulting in 494 OPAT courses. Interventions by an ID pharmacist were made for safety (56%), regimen complexity (41%), and efficacy (29%). Lack of formal ID physician consultation resulted in more interventions for safety (64% vs 48%, p < 0.001) and efficacy (36% vs 21%, p < 0.001). Discharge delays were avoided for 35 referrals, resulting in 228 hospital days avoided and approximately $366,000 in hospital bed cost savings. Use of OPAT was avoided in 75 referrals (13.2%), preventing central venous catheter placement in 48 patients (8.4%), resulting in an additional $58,080 in cost savings. CONCLUSIONS: The OPAT team optimized safety, efficacy, and convenience of OPAT while providing substantial cost savings. Further studies are needed to confirm the program's cost-effectiveness.