Breaking down the barriers: challenges with development and implementation of an industry-sponsored antimicrobial...

Partnership between clinicians and the pharmaceutical industry with a focus on antimicrobial stewardship research initiatives is a necessary step toward meeting the shared goals of combating inappropriate antimicrobial use, improving patient outcomes, and minimizing resistance development. Achieving these goals requires outcomes-focused data collection and monitoring tools for antimicrobial stewardship programs (ASP) that consider real-world data about how antimicrobials are used to treat patients. Here we highlight the experiences and challenges associated with the development and implementation of an industry-sponsored electronic antimicrobial stewardship data collection and analysis tool (AS-DCAT). The benefits and risks of the industry-sponsored AS-DCAT from the perspectives of the sponsoring company and participating sites are discussed. Barriers encountered as well as general considerations and recommendations for preventing or overcoming those barriers for future studies and tool development are provided.