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. 2022 Mar;30(3):317-328.
doi: 10.1016/j.jsps.2022.01.013. Epub 2022 Jan 22.

Patterns of antibiotic use, knowledge, and perceptions among different population categories: A comprehensive study based in Arabic countries

Ahmad R Alsayed  1 , Feras Darwish El Hajji  1 , Mohammad A A Al-Najjar  2 , Husam Abazid  1 , Abdullah Al-Dulaimi  1
Affiliations

Patterns of antibiotic use, knowledge, and perceptions among different population categories: A comprehensive study based in Arabic countries

Ahmad R Alsayed et al. Saudi Pharm J. 2022 Mar.

Abstract

Background: Antibiotics are essential for the treatment of bacterial infections and are considered among the most commonly sold drug classes from the community pharmacy in the developing countries without a prescription in most cases.

Purpose: This study aims to explore the knowledge, practices, and attitudes regarding antibiotic use.

Materials and methods: This study employs a cross-sectional descriptive design that used a pre-validated survey. The participants were classified into three main mutually exclusive groups: healthcare professionals, medical students, and other adults in the community.

Results: Of the 10,226 participants, 1157 (11%) were healthcare professionals; 2322 (23%) were medical students and 6747 (66%) were other adults in community. The majority of participants used antibiotic at least once during the past year. A total of 838 (72.4%) healthcare professionals and 800 (34.5%) medical students had prescribed an antibiotic during the last 6 months.Almost half of the medical students and adults in the community and almost one-third of healthcare professionals reported that the aim of antibiotics use is for fever. Furthermore, around one-quarter of participants reported that the aim of antibiotics use is for viral infection. Around one-quarter of respondents stated that the antibiotic will always be effective in the treatment of the same infection in the future. Around one-quarter of participants stated that 21 to 50% of antibiotics are considered to be unnecessary or inappropriate prescriptions. Different factors were perceived as being very important causes of antibiotic resistance among the participants.

Conclusions: These findings indicated that this study participants showed unsatisfactory knowledge and perceptions of proper antibiotic use. Therefore, there is a requirement for a comprehensive and effective antibiotic-stewardship program to promote rational antibiotics use, and compensate for knowledge and perceptions gaps to prevent antibiotic resistance development.

Keywords: AR, Antibiotics Resistance; Antibiotic; Arabic Countries; Group A, healthcare professionals; Group B, medical students; Group C, other adults in the community; Knowledge; Perceptions.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Distribution of the three methods used to collect data from the participants.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Distribution of the medical students participated in the study.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
The frequency of antibiotic use in the past year among the study participants.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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