ABSTRACT Inappropriate antibiotic prescribing in dentistry has been widely reported but local studies are scarce. We aimed to evaluate antibiotic prescribing practices among dental officers in a public dental primary care clinic against current guidelines: specifically assessing the number, appropriateness, accuracy of prescriptions, type of antibiotics prescribed and repeated prescribing of the same type of antibiotics within a specific duration. A retrospective audit consisting of two cycles (1st cycle: July to September 2018, 2nd cycle: July to September 2019) was carried out by manually collecting relevant data of patients (aged 18 and above) who were prescribed antibiotics from carbon copies of prescription books. Between each cycle, various interventions such as education through a continuous professional development (CPD) session, presentation of preliminary findings and making guidelines more accessible to dental officers were implemented. When the 1st and 2nd cycles were compared, the number of antibiotic prescriptions issued reduced from 194 to 136 (–30.0%) whereas the percentage of appropriate prescriptions increased slightly by 4.1%. Inaccurate prescriptions in terms of dosage and duration decreased (–0.5% and –13.7%, respectively) whilst drug form and frequency of intake increased (+15.7% and +0.7%, respectively). Repeated prescribing of the same antibiotics by the same officer within a period of ≤6 weeks no longer occurred. Amoxicillin and metronidazole were most commonly prescribed in both cycles. Overall, the antibiotic prescribing practices did not closely adhere to current guidelines. However, clinical audit in conjunction with targeted interventions resulted in improvement in the antibiotic prescribing patterns. Thus, further intervention and re-audit is necessary.
Anti-Bacterial Agents--administration & ; dosage ; Dental Clinics ; Clinical Audit

SUMMARY Introduction: Maternal mortality and morbidity from eclampsia continues to be seen around the globe. Local Key Performance Index on recurrence of eclamptic fits did not meet targets, thus this raised the issue whether the care provided adhered to the standard management for eclampsia. Methods: This clinical audit was conducted to assess and improve the quality of the service being offered to patient, particularly in managing eclampsia cases. It was conducted according to the audit cycle. It begins with the development of 12 standardized criteria for eclampsia management. First audit was conducted by retrospectively reviewing eclampsia cases from year 2008 till 2012. Strategies for changes were formulated and implemented following the results of the first audit. Second audit was conducted six months after the changes. Results: The overall incidence rate of eclampsia was 9.17 per 10,000 deliveries. A first seizure occurred during the antepartum period in 52.9% of cases (n=27), intrapartum in 24% (n=11) and postpartum in 21% of cases (n=13). Suboptimal care was mainly on delay of activation of Red Alert system and no treatment for uncontrolled blood pressure. Several strategies were implemented, mainly on improving working knowledge of the staffs and reengineering hospital Red Alert system. Positive achievements observed during the second audit, shown by a reduction in the number of patients with recurrence eclamptic fits and perinatal mortality rate. Conclusion: Conducting an audit is essential to evaluate local performance against the standardized criteria. Improvement can be achieved with inexpensive solutions and attainable within a short period of time.
Eclampsia ; Clinical Audit

While there is an ethical obligation to improve clinical outcomes by developing better therapies, surgical innovation has largely progressed without the strict regulations required of novel pharmaceutical products. We explore the reasons why new surgical techniques are frequently introduced without the benefit of randomised controlled trials, and present an approach to the ethical evaluation of novel surgical procedures.
Biomedical Research ; ethics ; Clinical Competence ; Diffusion of Innovation ; Ethics, Medical ; General Surgery ; ethics ; methods ; standards ; Humans ; Informed Consent ; Medical Audit ; Medicine ; Singapore ; Specialty Boards

BACKGROUND: Despite the increasing demand for transfusions, the availability of blood is hampered by low birth rate and stringent donor qualifications. Therefore, it is important to appropriately utilize blood products and take measures to minimize their wastage. We established an electronic review system for assessing transfusion practice and evaluated the appropriateness of blood transfusion. METHODS: Utilization of red blood cells (RBC), platelet concentrates (PC), single donor platelets (SDP), fresh-frozen plasma (FFP), and cryoprecipitates issued to 3 major blood using departments (Internal Medicine Divisions of Gastroenterology and Hematology/Medical Oncology, General Surgery) at the Seoul National University Hospital was reviewed over a one-month period. A new program was developed to review laboratory test results and blood product information. Criteria for appropriate transfusion were based on the guidelines proposed in 2009 by the Korean Ministry of Health and Welfare and the Korean Society of Blood Transfusion. A comparative audit was also conducted according to the guidelines proposed in 2002. RESULTS: There were 3,705 units of blood components issued to 325 patients during 1,542 transfusion episodes. The number of inappropriately transfused units were 402 (10.9%) at 144 (9.3%) episodes. The rates of inappropriate transfusion episodes (as per the 2002 guidelines) per blood components were as follows: RBC, 0.4%; PC, 11.7% (8.3%); SDP, 5.7% (2.4%); FFP, 20.2% (2.4%); and cryoprecipitates, 22.1%. CONCLUSION: Based on the 2009 guidelines, there was a notable inappropriate use of blood transfusions. Education programs promoting evidence-based guidelines and the use of this new program will help clinicians make better decisions in transfusion practice and lower inappropriate transfusion rates.
Birth Rate ; Blood Component Transfusion ; Blood Platelets ; Blood Transfusion ; Decision Support Systems, Clinical ; Electronics ; Electrons ; Erythrocytes ; Gastroenterology ; Humans ; Medical Audit ; Plasma ; Tissue Donors

BACKGROUND: Skin cancer is the most prevalent cancer by organ type and referral accuracy is vital for diagnosis and management. The British Association of Dermatologists (BAD) and literature highlight the importance of accurate skin lesion examination, diagnosis and educationally-relevant studies. METHODS: We undertook a review of the relevant literature, a national audit of skin lesion description standards and a study of speciality training influences on these descriptions. Questionnaires (n=200), with pictures of a circular and an oval lesion, were distributed to UK dermatology/plastic surgery consultants and speciality trainees (ST), general practitioners (GP), and medical students (MS). The following variables were analysed against a pre-defined 95% inclusion accuracy standard: site, shape, size, skin/colour, and presence of associated scars. RESULTS: There were 250 lesion descriptions provided by 125 consultants, STs, GPs, and MSs. Inclusion accuracy was greatest for consultants over STs (80% vs. 68%; P<0.001), GPs (57%) and MSs (46%) (P<0.0001), for STs over GPs (P<0.010) and MSs (P<0.0001) and for GPs over MSs (P<0.010), all falling below audit standard. Size description accuracy sub-analysis according to circular/oval dimensions was as follows: consultants (94%), GPs (80%), STs (73%), MSs (37%), with the most common error implying a quadrilateral shape (66%). Addressing BAD guidelines and published requirements for more empirical performance data to improve teaching methods, we performed a national audit and studied skin lesion descriptions. To improve diagnostic and referral accuracy for patients, healthcare professionals must strive towards accuracy (a circle is not a square). CONCLUSIONS: We provide supportive evidence that increased speciality training improves this process and propose that greater focus is placed on such training early on during medical training, and maintained throughout clinical practice.
Cicatrix ; Clinical Audit ; Consultants ; Delivery of Health Care ; Diagnosis ; Education* ; General Practitioners ; Humans ; Referral and Consultation ; Skin Neoplasms ; Skin* ; Students, Medical ; Surgery, Plastic ; Teaching ; Surveys and Questionnaires

OBJECTIVETo evaluate the monitoring and early warning functions of the occupational disease reporting system right now in China, and to analyze their influencing factors.

METHODSAn improved audit tool (ODIT) was used to score the monitoring and early warning functions with a total score of 10. The nine indices were completeness of information on the reporting form, coverage of the reporting system, accessibility of criteria or guidelines for diagnosis, education and training for physicians, completeness of the reporting system, statistical methods, investigation of special cases, release of monitoring information, and release of early warning information.

RESULTSAccording to the evaluation, the occupational disease reporting system in China had a score of 5.5 in monitoring existing occupational diseases with a low score for release of monitoring information; the reporting system had a score of 6.5 in early warning of newly occurring occupational diseases with low scores for education and training for physicians as well as completeness of the reporting system.

CONCLUSIONThe occupational disease reporting system in China still does not have full function in monitoring and early warning. It is the education and participation of physicians from general hospitals in the diagnosis and treatment of occupational diseases and suspected occupational diseases that need to be enhanced. In addition, the problem of monitoring the incidence of occupational diseases needs to be solved as soon as possible.

The evaluation of preventable trauma deaths can serve as an audit on the quality of trauma care provided by a hospital. The trauma injury severity score (TRISS) and clinical audit method were used retrospectively in evaluating 126 trauma mortalities admitted at the surgery ward of the Tarlac Provincial Hospital from January 1, 1995 to December 7,1997. Majority of these deaths occurred in ages below 40 years (67.46 percent) with a male to female ratio of 3:1. Ninety one trauma deaths (72.22 percent) were classified as unexpected deaths by the TRISS method while 35 (27.78 percent) were considered expected deaths. The clinical audit method classified 89 mortalities (70.63 percent) as preventable and 37(29.36 percent) as non-preventable. The preventable death rate was 70.63 percent. The TRISS method has a sensitivity of 80.89 percent and specificity of 48.65 percent. Its positive predictive value was 79.12 percent. Vehicular accidents topped the leading causes of mortality accounting for 58 of the 126 mortalities (46.03 percent) followed by burns at 22 (17.46 percent) and falls at 18 (14.29 percent). As to the immediate cause of death, intracranial injuries accounted for 55 mortalities in both the preventable and non-preventable deaths (35.95 percent) and 62.16 percent respectively) followed by 23 hypovolemic deaths, and 19 deaths due to pulmonary insufficiency. Preventive measures in the community should focus on vehicular and road safety while in-hospital improvements should concentrate on efforts to upgrade our capability of handling severe craniocerebral injuries. (Author)

BACKGROUND: The ability to accurately adjust for the severity of illness in outcome studies of critically ill patients is essential for clinical audits and trials. Several studies have been carried out to validate the acute physiology and chronic health evaluation (APACHE II) score in Korean ICUs. However, few reports have been presented that compare the performance of the APACHE II score and diagnostic category weighted APACHE II models in the surgical ICU population of Korea. The aim of this study was to validate APACHE II and compare the performance of the APACHE II and adjusted APACHE II models for emergency admission in a surgical intensive care unit (SICU) population. METHODS: A retrospective analysis of the prospective ICU registry was conducted in the SICU between October 2007 and February 2011. Calibration and discrimination were determined by the Hosmer-Lemeshow test and the area under the receiver operating characteristic (AUC) curve from patients. RESULTS: This study included 854 patients. SICU mortality was 9.4%. For APACHE II and adjusted APACHE II, AUCs were 0.791 and 0.757, respectively. Hosmer and Lemeshow C statistics showed good calibration for APAHCE II and for adjusted APACHE II (p > 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The ability of the APACHE II system in predicting group outcome is validated in a surgical ICU population by a receiver operating characteristic curve and logistic regression analysis. Mortality rates predicted using APACHE II exhibited good calibration and moderate discrimination. Diagnostic category weighted adjusted APACHE II did not improve the mortality prediction.
APACHE ; Area Under Curve ; Calibration ; Clinical Audit ; Critical Illness ; Discrimination (Psychology) ; Emergencies ; Humans ; Critical Care ; Korea ; Logistic Models ; Outcome Assessment (Health Care) ; Prospective Studies ; Retrospective Studies ; ROC Curve

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Pyogenic liver abscess (PLA) is a serious, life threatening condition with a high mortality rate that represents a diagnostic and therapeutic challenge. The aim of this study was to collect demographic data and clinical, laboratory and microbiological characteristics of PLA patients treated between 2000 and 2010. We also aimed to collect information regarding our management experience of these cases. METHODS: As a retrospective review, 47 patients with PLA in a tertiary referral center were examined to determine their demographic characteristics, clinical features, and laboratory, imaging, and microbiologic findings as well as the treatment outcome. RESULTS: Cryptogenic PLA was the most frequently identified type of PLA, while benign biliary tract disease was the most frequently identifiable cause of PLA (18/47 patients; 38.3%). Leukocytosis and elevated alanine transaminase were common laboratory findings and were observed in 35 (74.5%) and 22 (46.8%) patients, respectively. Increased fibrinogen was also detected in 11 of 15 investigated cases (73.3%). Notably, infection-induced thrombocytopenia occurred in 8 patients (17%). Diabetes mellitus was associated with the occurrence of infection induced shock when compared to the non-diabetic group (p<0.05). Patients with two or more comorbid diseases had longer hospitalizations when compared to patients with one comorbid disease or those without comorbidities (p<0.001). The number of days needed to establish diagnosis was correlated with the length of hospitalization (p<0.001). The overall hospital mortality rate was 2.1% (1/47). CONCLUSIONS: Characteristics of PLA patients from the past 10 years are presented. The number of days needed to establish a PLA diagnosis was correlated with the length of the hospital stay. The hospital stay of PLA patients can be further improved by early diagnosis and effective treatments during the early stages of PLA progression.
Alanine Transaminase ; Asian Continental Ancestry Group ; Biliary Tract Diseases ; Clinical Audit ; Comorbidity ; Diabetes Mellitus ; Early Diagnosis ; Fibrinogen ; Hospital Mortality ; Hospitalization ; Humans ; Length of Stay ; Leukocytosis ; Liver Abscess, Pyogenic ; Retrospective Studies ; Shock ; Tertiary Care Centers ; Thrombocytopenia ; Treatment Outcome

BACKGROUND: Deficiencies in anaphylaxis management in Emergency Departments is well recognised despite established guidelines for its treatment. OBJECTIVE: To identify deficiencies in the management of anaphylaxis in a busy metropolitan Emergency Department and determine if an education intervention could correct these. METHODS: Paediatric and adult admissions to the Emergency Department of a busy hospital were tracked over a 10-month period with a targeted educational program being instituted at 5 months. The electronic records were retrospectively reviewed looking for cases of anaphylaxis and milder forms of immediate type allergic reactions presenting with a combination of urticaria and nonairway threatening angioedema. Anaphylaxis presentation was graded using the Brown grading system. Use of all medication during resuscitation was documented. Observation period before discharge and referral to specialist unit for follow-up was noted. RESULTS: In the first 5 months, 38 patients fulfilled our criteria. Three had severe anaphylaxis, 13 had moderately severe anaphylaxis and 12 had urticaria and angioedema without anaphylaxis. Anaphylaxis was not always recognised or graded leading to inappropriate management with adrenaline often being withheld. Promethazine, usually given in parenteral form, was frequently administered. Observation time was often inadequate. Referral to an immunologist was not universally followed through. Following the educational intervention 58 patients fulfilled our criteria over the next 5 months. The appropriate use of adrenaline increased by 21% and the use of sedating antihistamines decreased by 16%, while the number of referrals to an immunologist increased by 24%. There was an 11% reduction in the number of patients who were observed for at least 4 hours. CONCLUSION: A number of deficiencies in the management of anaphylaxis presentations have been identified. Targeted educational activities aimed at the Emergency Department hospital staff may improve outcomes.
Adult ; Anaphylaxis ; Angioedema ; Clinical Audit ; Education ; Emergencies ; Emergency Service, Hospital ; Epinephrine ; Follow-Up Studies ; Histamine H1 Antagonists ; Humans ; Hypersensitivity ; Practice Guidelines as Topic ; Promethazine ; Referral and Consultation ; Resuscitation ; Retrospective Studies ; Specialization ; Urticaria