Stanford offers free online course in antibiotic stewardship

January 12th, 2015

The division of infectious diseases in the Stanford University School of Medicine is offering an online course on the hottest topic in health care epidemiology: antibiotic stewardship.

“Antimicrobial Stewardship: Optimization of Antibiotic Practices” offers a practical approach to prescribing antibiotic therapy and development of antimicrobial stewardship to physicians and pharmacists across all specialties and settings.

Available until Nov. 22, 2015, the course offers six hours of CME credit for a processing fee of $20. Otherwise there is no charge. It is estimated that approximately 50% of antibiotic use, in both the outpatient and inpatient settings, is inappropriate. At the same time, in contrast to any other class of drugs, every antibiotic use has a potential public health consequence – inappropriate use may not harm only the individual patient, but contributes to societal harm by exerting an unnecessary selective pressure that may lead to antibiotic resistance among bacteria, Stanford states in describing the problem.

Part I of the course focuses on the underlying clinical science of antimicrobial use. Part 2 details the practical aspects of implementing an antimicrobial stewardship program, as well as the application of such programs to special circumstances and populations. Learning objectives include:

•Develop skills to apply IDSA guidelines in treating common infections such as acute rhino-sinusitis.

•Apply evidence based antibiotic management to treat sepsis.

•Implement principles of antimicrobial stewardship when providing care to special populations and in various settings.

•Apply evidence based antibiotic management to surgical patients requiring antibiotic prophylaxis.

•Apply evidence based antibiotic stewardship program in the outpatient setting