Quality assuring adult anti‐microbial guidelines
International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance
ISSN: 0952-6862
Article publication date: 16 March 2012
Abstract
Purpose
Guidelines have been produced in nearly all developed countries to provide cost‐effective hospital care. The study's purpose, therefore, was to determine whether a London hospital's anti‐microbial guidelines conform to this principle.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper's approach was a literature search to determine anti‐microbial therapies for certain diseases and comparing outcomes with what hospital guidelines recommend.
Findings
There are significant discrepancies in the hospital anti‐microbial guidelines and what is recommended in the literature.
Research limitations/implications
Local microbial patterns for these diseases were not studied as they were not formally available and these could have had an impact on guidelines recommendations.
Practical implications
Local guidelines influence day‐to‐day hospital clinical practice and their robustness is important. They need to comply with national and/or international guidelines. Deviations from these guidelines need appropriate comments within the documents to highlight their validity. Such an approach would facilitate medical students and junior doctor training who depend on these guidelines for good clinical practice.
Originality/value
The study provides an important contribution to developing hospital clinical guidelines.
Keywords
Citation
Al Mahdy, H. (2012), "Quality assuring adult anti‐microbial guidelines", International Journal of Health Care Quality Assurance, Vol. 25 No. 3, pp. 226-231. https://doi.org/10.1108/09526861211210448
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2012, Emerald Group Publishing Limited