The Benefits of Introducing the Eucast System for the Rationalization of Hospital Antibiotic Therapy

On April 1, 2011, Poland adopted new EUCAST recommendations for microbial susceptibility testing, approved by the National Consultant for Microbiology. They contain important guidelines for microbiologists and many valuable data for physicians concerning antimicrobial drugs. The introduction of these recommendations to hospitals by microbiological laboratories involves changes in the interpretation of antibiograms. The breakpoints that determine the classification of strains into sensitive or resistant groups have been altered in most cases. Along with the new breakpoints, the dosage of many antibiotics has been updated, too. New EUCAST recommendations are fully accepted by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) as they are based on extensive research on infection pathogenesis and drug pharmacokinetics. The aim of the new recommendations is to standardize the rules concerning antimicrobial susceptibility tests and their interpretation as well as to increase the usefulness of the test results for the effective treatment of microbiological infections.