No Single Strategy Effective to Control Antibiotic Prescribing in Hospitals

Antibiotic Prescribing Drugs

Plenty of promising strategies exist to control antibiotic-prescribing practices, but no single method emerges as the best for hospital patients, according to a new review of studies.

Antibiotics combat bacterial infections, like strep throat. But its overuse has been tied to a rise in organisms that build a resistance to the drugs.

The systematic review of data from 66 studies appears in the current issue of The Cochrane Library, a publication of The Cochrane Collaboration, an international organization that evaluates medical research. Systematic reviews draw evidence-based conclusions about medical practice after considering both the content and quality of existing medical trials on a topic.

Most of the studies were conducted at a single hospital