Study on prescription pattern of antibiotics in Dermatology OPD of a tertiary care teaching hospital of tribal region of India

Objectives: To assess the prescription pattern of Antibiotics in Dermatology OPD of a tertiary care teaching hospital of Bastar district, a tribal region of Chhattisgarh state at central-south India. Methods: All the prescriptions issued to the patients attending the dermatology OPD from January 2015 to March 2015 were recorded and assessed as per WHO guidelines for Drug Utilization Studies. Results: The total number of drugs prescribed in the 3650 prescriptions was 10,002 and average number of drugs per prescription being 2.74. For 12.96% patients, ? 4 drugs were prescribed on a single prescription. Antibiotics were prescribed in 18.68% of total prescriptions. Antibiotics were most commonly prescribed for Acne vulgaris (8.16% of total prescriptions). Most preferred route for Antibiotics administration was oral (66.51%). Majority of the Antibiotics were given by the combination therapy of oral and topical route (79.57%). Injectable Antibiotics were prescribed in 0.69% of total Antibiotics use. The most commonly used antibiotic was Doxycycline (33.87% of total prescriptions containing antibiotics) followed by Amoxicillin 24.34% and Azithromycin 13.34%. Large numbers of the Antibiotics (81.96%) were prescribed by generic names. Conclusions: Acne vulgaris was most common indication for antibiotics in the studied dermatology OPD. We found good prescribing habit in our study but adequate information was not written in some records with regards to the quantity of the topical antibiotics and prescribing by generic name. Systemically Beta-Lactam antibiotics and topically Mupirocin were the two most commonly prescribed agents. Prescribing combination of oral antibiotics with topical antibiotics was found to be high.