Duration of antibiotic treatment in surgical infections of the abdomen. The future: randomised prospective studies.

The important questions are: what is the most efficient, least costly, and least hazardous way of providing antimicrobial therapy to postoperative patients? These questions, and the answers, are integral to the practice of medicine. I discuss a few pitfalls associated with antibiotic studies and suggest potential solutions. I urge doctors interested in these problems to focus on establishing the hospital systems needed to provide continuous feedback, rather than sporadic information driven by collegial requests.