# Hospital Clinicians’ Knowledge of and Opportunity and Motivation for Prescribing Short Antibiotic Courses for Common Infections

## TL;DR

Hospital doctors generally know recommended short antibiotic courses but lack knowledge for severe pneumonia, which could help reduce unnecessary antibiotic use.

## Contribution

Identifies a knowledge gap in prescribing short antibiotic courses for severe pneumonia among hospital clinicians.

## Key findings

- Most doctors knew recommended short antibiotic courses except for severe pneumonia.
- Only 44% of doctors chose shorter courses for severe pneumonia.
- Doctors did not believe longer courses were more effective than shorter ones.

## Abstract

Short-course antibiotic therapies for common infections treated in hospital are supported by national guidelines. Hospital clinicians’ knowledge of the course length recommendations for the management of common infections has not been fully explored. This study aims to assess doctors’ knowledge of and explores their opportunity and motivation for prescribing short-course therapy. A survey was emailed to all prescribers working in adult medical specialties in two hospitals in England. The survey responses from both hospitals were pooled before analysis. One hundred and sixty-five responses were provided. Knowledge of the recommended short course lengths was high overall, except for severe community-acquired/hospital-acquired pneumonia (CAP/HAP), with only 44% of respondents opting for shorter-course therapy. The majority did not believe longer courses were more effective than shorter courses. We identified a gap in prescriber knowledge for appropriate antibiotic course lengths for severe CAP/HAP. Addressing this gap may contribute to antimicrobial stewardship efforts to reduce course lengths in line with national guidelines.