Health Alliance for Prudent Prescription and Yield of Antibiotics in a Patient-centered Perspective

ended

The HAPPY PATIENT project aims at reducing the inappropriate use and dispensing of antibiotics in the most common community-acquired infections (i.e., respiratory tract infections, urinary tract infections, dental infections) with a multifaceted intervention in health care facilities as suggested in point 4.2 of the EU guidelines for the prudent use of antimicrobials in human health. The multifaceted intervention will be carried out in five countries with a diverse pattern of antibiotic consumption: ES, FR, LT, PL and GR. We will follow a model which both promotes both stakeholder stewardship and is patient-centred. The critical focus will be on the most important interaction in determining usage of antibiotics: contact between patients and health professionals at different levels of the Health Care System. Hence, activities of HAPPY PATIENT will target patients, primary care professionals (general practitioners, nurses, and dentists), secondary care (out-of-hours services), nursing homes and community pharmacists. We will follow the Audit Project Odense (APO) methodology developed in FP6 HAPPY AUDIT project. APO consists of an audit-based registration to perform a context analysis before the implementation of the multifaceted intervention, and then to perform an assessment of changes after the implementation of the multifaceted intervention. Based on the Normalization Process Theory for changing behaviour, the multifaceted intervention will include: a) peer feedback with reflexion and discussion, b) enhancement of communication skills in order to improve the communication process between the health professionals and the patients, c) patient information leaflets and posters, d) country-tailored information on antibiotic usage(incl. the “antibiotic foot-print”). HAPPY PATIENT expects to reduce the inappropriate prescription of antibiotics by 40%. Its key outputs will be both scalable and capable of implementation throughout the diverse health systems in the EU.