Focus: antibiotic/antimicrobial stewardship

Antimicrobial stewardship: The term ‘antimicrobial stewardship’ is defined as ‘an organisational or healthcare-system-wide approach to promoting and monitoring judicious use of antimicrobials to preserve their future effectiveness’.¹

Antibiotic stewardship: Antibiotic stewardship is the effort to measure and improve how antibiotics are prescribed by clinicians and used by patients. Improving antibiotic prescribing involves implementing effective strategies to modify prescribing practices to align them with evidence-based recommendations for diagnosis and management.²

Bioburden: degree of microbial contamination or microbial load; the number and effects of microorganisms contaminating a wound.

Biofilm: colonies of single bacterial or fungal species, or more commonly, polymicrobial organisms (bacterial, fungal, and possibly, viral) that group together and cover themselves with a slimy, glue-like protective coating (extracellular polymeric substance) to protect the colonies from outside invaders;³ biofilms can form on medical devices, in wounds, on sutures and many other surfaces.