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To help address these challenges, we suggest viewing antimicrobial stewardship as a strategy, a coherent set of actions which promote using antimicrobials responsibly. We stress the continuous need for 'responsible use' to be defined and translated into context-specific and time-specific actions. Furthermore, we present examples of actions that can be undertaken within antimicrobial stewardship across human and animal health.

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BackgroundThis study aimed to assess: 1) vaccine hesitancy (VH) prevalence among French general practitioners (GPs) through the frequency of their vaccine recommendations, and 2) the determinants of these recommendations.MethodsCross-sectional observational study in 2014 nested in a national panel of 1712 randomly selected GPs in private practice in France. We constructed a score of self-reported recommendation frequency for 6 specific vaccines to target populations.Results16% to 43% of GPs sometimes or never recommended at least one specific vaccine to their target patients. Multivariable logistic regressions of the dichotomized score showed that GPs recommended vaccines frequently when they felt comfortable explaining their benefits and risks to patients (OR = 1.87; 1.35–2.59), or trusted official sources of information highly (OR = 1.40; 1.01–1.93). They recommended vaccines infrequently when they considered that adverse effects were likely (OR = 0.71; 0.52–0.96) or doubted the vaccine's utility (OR = 0.21; 0.15–0.29).InterpretationOur findings show that after repeated vaccine controversies in France, some VH exists among French GPs, whose recommendation behaviors depend on their trust in authorities, their perception of the utility and risks of vaccines, and their comfort in explaining them. Further research is needed to confirm these results among health care workers in other countries.

Our objective was to assess junior doctors' perceptions of their antibiotic prescribing practice and of bacterial resistance. We surveyed 190 postgraduate doctors still in training at two university teaching hospitals, in Nice (France) and Dundee (Scotland, UK), and 139 of them (73%) responded to the survey. The main results presented in this abstract are combined for Nice and Dundee, because there was no statistical difference for these points between the two hospitals. Antibiotic resistance was perceived as a national problem by 95% of the junior doctors, but only 63% rated the problem as important in their own daily practice. Their perceptions of the causes of antibiotic resistance were sometimes at variance with available medical evidence, with excessive duration of antibiotic treatment and poor hand hygiene practices rarely being perceived as important drivers for resistance. Only 31% and 26% of the doctors knew the correct prevalences of antibiotic misuse and of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus in hospitals, respectively. They preferred educational interventions, such as specific teaching sessions, availability of guidelines or readily accessible advice from an infectious diseases specialist, to improve antibiotic prescribing, rather than restricted prescription of antibiotics. These data provide helpful information for the design of strategies to optimize adherence to good antimicrobial stewardship.

Widespread antimicrobial use has compromised its value, leading to a crisis of antimicrobial resistance. A major cause of misuse is insufficient knowledge of prescribing of antimicrobials in many categories of professionals. An important principle of antimicrobial stewardship is avoiding selection pressure in the patient, both on pathogen and commensal by avoiding unnecessary use, choosing the least broad-spectrum antibiotic, adequate doses, a good timing and the shortest possible duration. Up to now, most educational efforts have been targeted at professionals (mostly medical doctors) after their training and at the adult public. In the past few years, progress has been made in educating children. It is now crucial that academia and ministries of Health and Education jointly focus on an adapted undergraduate medical/professional curriculum that teaches all necessary principles of microbiology, infectious diseases and clinical pharmacology, with emphasis on the principles of prudent prescribing.

The worldwide development and implementation of AMS programmes varies considerably. Our results should inform and encourage the further evaluation of this with a view to promoting a worldwide stewardship framework. The prospective measurement of well-defined outcomes of the impact of these programmes remains a significant challenge.

Students wanted further education on antibiotic prescribing, and areas of lack of confidence were found. Students overestimated the current burden of resistant bacteria and were unaware of successes in reducing MRSA infections. Educational and stewardship programmes may benefit from including more cases of diagnostic uncertainty, and highlighting successes such as MRSA prevention, as evidence for the importance of current interventions.