Measurement and reporting of antimicrobial use (AU) and antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a core component of antimicrobial stewardship (AS). In public health, the point-prevalence survey (PPS) approach has been used to establish national estimates of AU in acute care and long-term care settings. A PPS is an approach to identify the number of people with a disease or condition at a specific point in time. In the case of AU, the PPS has been used to determine the number of people receiving antimicrobial treatment on a given day. National PPS for healthcare settings have compiled the number of individuals on an antibiotic in many individual facilities into a national estimate of how many people receive antimicrobials in these settings per day. Information is also gathered about antimicrobial type, class, and reason for use, as well as general patient details.

The companion animal veterinary profession lacks data to evaluate antibiotic use (AU) and antibiotic stewardship (AS) practices, but inappropriate AU is likely as prevalent in clinic-based veterinary practice as it is in human medicine. In a single-center study, 38% of canine antibiotics in a veterinary teaching hospital were prescribed without documented evidence of infection. The International Society for Companion Animal Infectious Diseases (ISCAID) has published AU guidelines for canine superficial bacterial folliculitis and for canine and feline urinary tract and respiratory tract disease. However, without AU data, we cannot assess adherence to these guidelines, measure trends, or describe broader AS practices. PPS can be used to collect uniform data from multiple sites over a single time period, providing a snapshot of practice and valuable information to guide profession-wide improvement.

In 2020, a national antibiotic use point-prevalence survey in 14 U.S. veterinary teaching hospitals was conducted. Learn about those results in this one-page infographic.

The goal of this study is to establish an estimate of AU in U.S. and Canadian small animal teaching hospitals, to describe how and why antibiotics are prescribed to small animal patients, and to identify change in antibiotic prescribing from 2020.

Each participating hospital must identify a primary contact for this study. This person, or designated team, will be responsible for obtaining local ethics approval (e.g., Institutional Review Board, IRB), if necessary, completing a pre-facility survey (e.g., services offered, hospital capacity, urban/rural characteristics), attending a 1-hour online training session, identifying a survey date, generating a census of patients on study services on the survey date, collecting medical record information for each animal included in that census into an online data collection tool, completing a post-survey assessment of how data collection went, and communicating with the research team for data validation and other study coordination.

Approximately 15 hours will be required for each survey year, however, an exact time estimate will vary depending on size of hospital.

We do NOT want any information regarding your clients and you will NOT be giving us any direct access to your medical record system. Rather, your designated Facility Coordinator will collect data from your records system regarding all patients seen on a specified date and enter information into an electronic database (REDCap). The key information needed for each patient is patient signalment, reason for visit and chief complaint, diagnostic tests and imaging conducted, and antibiotics and antiseptics prescribed.

Rest assured that the data you share with us will remain completely confidential, and any published summary of the study results will contain no information that will make it possible to identify any patient, client, or practice.

In 2020, a similar national antibiotic use point-prevalence survey in 14 U.S. veterinary teaching hospitals was conducted. Learn about those results in this one-page infographic.

Absolutely - we would be delighted to talk further with you and share more details. Please reach out to Emma Leof Bollig, Program Manager and Lead Epidemiologist, University of Minnesota at cavsnet@umn.edu.

Funding for this project is being made possible by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration through grant number 1U01FD007061-01.

In 2020, a national antibiotic use point-prevalence survey in 14 U.S. veterinary teaching hospitals was conducted. Learn about those results in this one-page infographic.

This study was repeated in 2022 with 31 U.S. and Canadian veterinary teaching hospitals participating. Learn about those results in this one-page infographic.