Browsing by Author "Ojo, Olawale"

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    Antibiotic prescribing practice in the Intensive Care Unit of a Nigerian teaching hospital
    (Ethiopian Society of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine., 2026) Ige, Olufemi Adebayo; Ojo, Olawale; Adewumi Oluwaseyi; Agah Overcomer
    Background: Antibiotics are vital in the prevention and treatment of bacterial in- fections. However, prescribing practices often deviate from established guidelines with prolonged durations of surgical prophylaxis, redundant antibiotic combina- tions, and a significant reliance on broad-spectrum agents. This study aims to de- termine antibiotic prescribing practices at our teaching hospital. Methods: This was a prospective, descriptive, cross-sectional study of adult pa- tients admitted to the ICU at the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital, Ilorin, Kwa- ra State, Nigeria. The study participants were critically ill patients between the ag- es of 6 months and 65 years who were admitted to the ICU. Using a questionnaire, information such as age, sex, diagnosis, antibiotic prescription, regularity of admin- istration, use of microbiological investigations, and outcome of ICU care was ex- tracted from the patients’ hospital files and recorded. Data from this study were summarized and reported as means ± standard deviation, frequencies, or propor- tions of the total. A p-value of less than 0.05 was considered statistically signifi- cant. Results: A total of 128 ICU patients were enrolled in the study. One hundred and twenty-four (96.88%) patients were prescribed antibiotics. Antibiotic prescriptions were for prophylactic reasons in 56 (45.16%) patients and for therapeutic reasons in 68 (54.84%) patients. All antibiotic prescriptions were empirical. The most fre- quently prescribed antibiotic was ceftriaxone. The most frequently prescribed anti- biotic combination was Ceftriaxone/Metronidazole. There was no statistically sig- nificant difference in gender (0.7651) and age (p = 0.0775) between those who sur- vived to ICU discharge and those who died. Prophylactic antibiotic prescription was associated with survival to ICU discharge compared to therapeutic prescription (p = 0.0018). Conclusion: Ceftriaxone was the primary empirical ICU antibiotic therapy, while metronidazole was used strategically for anaerobic coverage. In this study, critical care physicians favored empirical therapy over targeted therapy.