Supporting antimicrobial stewardship
Better information about the usage of antibiotics in hospitals was the starting point for Triscribe. We are still learning and still building...
Triscribe proper was born to build analytics around antibiotic usage. We worked with our partners at UHS and the Health Foundation on the ADAPTA project through 2018 to deliver the best analytics available at the time. COVID has made the challenge of antimicrobial stewardship more urgent if anything. And we have continued building and extending our software in response:
Medicines shortages were a big issue during the pandemic. In response to this we carried out a complete rebuild of our defined daily dose (DDD) charts. And combined these with pharmacy stock data to provide AI on the drugs most at risk of shortage. As well as giving antimicrobial pharmacists an accurate tool for daily analysis of usage by DDD.
DDDs and days of therapy (DOTs) are not ideal for analysing antimicrobials given to kids. We were approached by a Paediatric Microbiology Consultant to help. Now Triscribe allows you to analyse DDDs or DOTs per 100 bed days with a rolling average for whatever period suits. The data is updated daily (not 6 weeks out of date) and can be broken down by ward or by age/ gender demographic.
Another challenge inherent in lack of data is understanding the impact of clinical or policy interventions. Our Antibiotic Prescription length chart was developed for this reason. One hospital customer had introduced a policy of reducing default prescription lengths from 7 days to 5. Without Triscribe they had no way of telling whether prescribers were complying with the policy. And no way of seeing the impact. This chart gave them both at the touch of a button.
We will continue working to improve our software. As always our aim is to provide frontline clinicians with the support they need. If you work in antimicrobial stewardship and there is other information you think you need let us know. Or if you just want to hear more, then just hit reply to this email.
Meantime, the image below shows a brief summary of the antimicrobial analytics that are standard in our software today.