Effect of Patient Antibiotic Education on Provider Perceived Patient Expectation for Antibiotics

Abstract

Antibiotic resistance is a global concern that costs the world thousands of lives and the United States billions of dollars annually in healthcare expenditures and missed work. One reason that providers prescribe antibiotics unnecessarily is to fulfill the perceived expectation that the patient wants antibiotics. The purpose of this antibiotic education project was to determine if providing evidence based patient education about antibiotic use decreased the provider perceived patient expectation for an antibiotic prescription in adult patients with upper respiratory symptoms at a family practice clinic. The project had a total of 295 patient encounters, 146 pre-intervention and 149 post intervention. Providers were educated to use the content in the Center for Disease Control’s Get Smart: Know When Antibiotics Work patient education brochure. The providers completed a survey about if they perceived that the patients wanted an antibiotic prescription in the pre-intervention and post-intervention groups. The perceived patient desire for an antibiotic did not decrease after the intervention, but data collected did validate that if a provider perceives that a patient desires an antibiotic prescription, then they are more likely to receive one. Additional studies are needed to determine if the Center for Disease Control patient education brochure could be used with clients in the clinic to decrease the pressure placed on providers to provide antibiotic prescriptions which could improve patient quality of care.