Objective. To address the public health concern of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) transmission, various intrapersonal and organizational factors were identified to explore opportunities for pharmacists as part of a HIV/HCV prevention strategy. The awareness and comfort of pharmacists practicing in independent pharmacies and student pharmacists on providing HIV and HCV point-of-care (POC) tests in an urban setting were investigated. Method. Surveys were anonymously completed by pharmacists practicing in independent pharmacies within a 2-mile radius of our institution and student pharmacists attending our institution. Surveys were administered over a period of 10 weeks. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. Results. A total of 119 pharmacy students and 23 practicing licensed pharmacists completed the survey. Only 21.7% of pharmacists were aware that HIV and HCV screenings are available as POC tests. Pharmacists were more likely to feel comfortable administering other POC tests and not HIV or HCV POC tests. Student pharmacists felt more comfortable than pharmacists in administering HIV and HCV POC tests and had a higher perceived level of comfort of their ability to administer these tests as licensed pharmacists. Conclusions. In this urban setting, awareness and comfort in pharmacist-provided HIV and HCV POC testing is low, however, with proper training and education, pharmacists in these community pharmacy practice settings can expand HIV and HCV screening opportunities for the community.
BackgroundEarly organism identification via rapid diagnostics has been shown to reduce time to effective antimicrobial therapy and improve patient outcomes in patients with bacteremia, but antimicrobial susceptibility testing is still required to optimize therapy. The objective of this study was to determine the impact of an institution-specific rapid susceptibility testing method on outcomes in patients with bacteremia.MethodsThis was a retrospective pre- and post-intervention study of 100 adult patients with bacteremia. Patients were excluded if they had polymicrobial infection, fungemia, blood cultures collected at outside hospitals, or if they expired prior to susceptibility results. Patients were identified through a report containing positive blood cultures from October 2017 to February 2018 (pre-intervention [PrI]) and October 2018 to February 2019 (post-intervention [PoI]). The primary endpoint was the rate of clinical failure (a composite of 28-day mortality or bacteremia persisting greater than 6 days). Secondary endpoints included microbiologic outcomes, time to effective and optimal therapy, length of stay (LOS) and therapy adjustments.ResultsBaseline characteristics were similar between groups; a third of the patients were immunosuppressed (Table 1). The most common sources of infection were urinary and intra-abdominal, and the most common organisms identified were E.coli and Klebsiella spp. No significant difference in the rate of clinical failure was identified between PrI and PoI (24% vs. 18%, P = 0.6242) (Table 2). In the PoI, the time to identification, susceptibility results, and effective therapy was significantly shorter with similar time to optimal therapy and LOS. In the PoI, antimicrobial stewardship program (ASP) interventions were made significantly sooner after susceptibility results.ConclusionIn this small, retrospective, single-center study, the implementation of a rapid susceptibility testing method was associated with reduced time to susceptibility results and more rapid interventions by the ASP, but no difference in the rate of clinical failure or time to optimal therapy was identified. Disclosures All authors: No reported disclosures.
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