Prevalence of antimicrobial empirical therapy & its consequences in Health Care centre of Pakistan: A Cross Sectional Study

Abstract

Empirical therapy is the therapy based on experience and, more specifically, therapy begun on the basis of a clinical educated guess in the absence of complete or perfect information. Drugs used as empiric therapy usually have broad spectrum but once the pathogen of illness has been diagnose the narrow spectrum antibiotic should be use which is effective against that particular type of pathogen. In this study we aimed to know about the most prevalent trend of empirical therapy in Pakistan by different physicians and their attitude towards treating the patient. For the purpose of this study different wards and OPDs were visited and relatively 100 of the prescriptions and case histories were observed to come to know about the different consequences in which the empirical therapy is use most commonly. Nearly only 39% of the physicians out of 100 % recommend culture sensitive testing to patients. Augmentin is the most commonly used empiric drug (26%) after that ciprofloxacin (15%) and erythromycin (8%) use commonly. Patients experience a varieties of side effects by the use of empiric drugs like sedation (38%), nausea (30%) etc. After careful consideration it was concluded that ancoherent practices prevalence have been raising dangerously which needs careful review by health authorities.