Background: High rate of
antibiotic prescription is commonly encountered in
hospital settings. Although the problem of the irrational use of
antibiotics is particularly acute in
rural health centers of
developing countries ,
antibiotic utilization studies in such areas are scarce. In this study, we aimed to compare
antibiotic prescription patterns between
inpatients and
outpatients in a rural
general hospital .
Methods: Inpatient and
outpatient records were evaluated during a 1-month period. Data including
patients ’ demographics, length of
hospital stay , final
diagnosis ,
antibiotic regimen, dosing, rout of
administration , microbiological
culture /
sensitivity tests and other
laboratory data were retrieved from the
hospital information system .
Results: The number of
prescriptions with at least one
antibiotic was 686/1410 (48.6%) cases and 3812/6126 (62.2%) cases for
inpatient and
outpatient prescriptions , respectively. The mean number of
antibiotic per
prescription was 1.7±0.7 and 1.3±0.8 for
inpatient and
outpatients , respectively (p<0.05).
Ceftriaxone had the highest rate of
prescription among hospitalized
patients with 791 (35.2%) times encounter while
penicillin constituted the largest proportion of
outpatient administrations with 2505 (29.8%) times. About 79% of
inpatient and 62% of
outpatient prescriptions containing final
diagnosis data had the correct indication.
Conclusion: Our study showed that implementation of strict
regulations for
antibiotic use is extremely needed in this
rural hospital . Establishing local guidelines, providing adequate
education for
healthcare professionals and putting restrictions for broadspectrum
antibiotic use can be beneficial.