Evaluation of prescribing patterns for pediatric community-acquired pneumonia in the outpatient department of a tertiary-care medical center in the Philippines

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVES@#This study evaluated the antibiotic prescribing patterns in pediatric patients in the Out Patient Department (OPD) of the Philippine Children’s Medical Center (PCMC) where it may encourage drug monitoring and improvement in the utilization of antibiotics in the department.@*MATERIALS AND METHODS@#A descriptive, cross-sectional study involving patient encounters selected using convenience sampling was conducted at the outpatient department of PCMC. All previously healthy pediatric patients aged 3 months to 18 years diagnosed with pediatric community- acquired pneumonia (PCAP) with no known acute and chronic comorbidities were included. The observed values of the antibiotic prescribing indicators were compared with the optimal values recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO), and the Index of Rational Drug Prescribing (IRDP) was calculated.@*RESULTS@#A total of 600 patients diagnosed with PCAP were included in the study seen at the PCMC OPD from January 2020 to July 2022. Ninety-six percent of the patient encounters had at least one antibiotic prescribed (SD + 0.20). The average number of medicines prescribed per patient encounter was 2.05 (SD + 0.85). Of these, 100% were prescribed by generic name and were prescribed from the essential drug list. The most commonly prescribed medications were antibiotics (43.17%) with coamoxiclav (42.93%), amoxicillin (37.76%), and cefuroxime (7.59%) being the top three commonly prescribed antibiotics.@*CONCLUSION@#With respect to the IRDP, PCMC scores well with 3.16 where the most rational score is 4. However, this study highlights the high occurrence of prescribing antibiotics in the institution.