Impact of chronic diseases on antibiotic use rates in the community – INSPQ
May 2022
The Institut National de Santé Publique du Québec has just published a report on the use of antimicrobials in Quebec.
This reinforces our convictions and our motivation at Smartbiotic: to develop tools to help physicians prescribe antibiotics to enhance the health of populations!
Explicitly:
- “More than 5,000 deaths were directly attributable to antimicrobial resistance and it resulted in $1.4 billion in additional costs to the health care system.”
- “Fear of drug interactions makes it difficult to choose an antimicrobial.”
- “48% of patients 65 years and older receive potentially inappropriate medication.”
- “Specific clinical guidelines could be developed to improve antimicrobial prescribing.”
Antimicrobial resistance is a major human cost. It is also a cost to the Quebec health care system. But it is by no means a fatality!