Infrastructure and training goals include ensuring that clinical laboratories can detect and report resistant pathogens to clinicians and that public health agencies can respond appropriately. The ultimate goal we share is the prevention and control of antimicrobial resistance. Although specific measures differ for different pathogens, a common theme is that antimicrobial drug use exerts selective pressure favoring resistance. Judicious prescribing of antimicrobials is therefore essential to maximize the life of existing drugs while new drugs are being developed. Simple strategies such as washing one's hands between patients must be reinforced continuously.
Family physicians are on the front lines in the battle against antimicrobial resistance.
In caring for patients with a wide range of ages and presenting conditions, they represent the first link in the chain of surveillance and play a critical role in developing and implementing realistic prevention and control recommendations, and educating patients. Public health agencies can assist clinicians by providing surveillance summaries, updated treatment information and educational materials, and by facilitating the development and evaluation of new drugs, vaccines and diagnostic tests. In respiratory illness seasons, the most important contribution that physicians can make is to limit the prescribing of antimicrobial drugs. The CDC estimates that 50 million unnecessary prescriptions of antibiotics for upper respiratory infections are written annually in the United States, representing enormous selective pressure for resistant bacteria. Unnecessary antibiotic use increases an individual patient's risk of acquiring a drug-resistant infection, not just the community's risk.