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Formulating a Community-Centric Indicator Framework to Quantify One Health Drivers of Antibiotic Resistance: A Preliminary Step towards Fostering ‘Antibiotic-Smart Communities’
Mathew, P.; Chandy, S.J.; Sivaraman, S.; Ranjalkar, J.; Ali, H.M.; Thomas, S.A. Formulating a Community-Centric Indicator Framework to Quantify One Health Drivers of Antibiotic Resistance: A Preliminary Step towards Fostering ‘Antibiotic-Smart Communities’. Antibiotics2024, 13, 63.
Mathew, P.; Chandy, S.J.; Sivaraman, S.; Ranjalkar, J.; Ali, H.M.; Thomas, S.A. Formulating a Community-Centric Indicator Framework to Quantify One Health Drivers of Antibiotic Resistance: A Preliminary Step towards Fostering ‘Antibiotic-Smart Communities’. Antibiotics 2024, 13, 63.
Mathew, P.; Chandy, S.J.; Sivaraman, S.; Ranjalkar, J.; Ali, H.M.; Thomas, S.A. Formulating a Community-Centric Indicator Framework to Quantify One Health Drivers of Antibiotic Resistance: A Preliminary Step towards Fostering ‘Antibiotic-Smart Communities’. Antibiotics2024, 13, 63.
Mathew, P.; Chandy, S.J.; Sivaraman, S.; Ranjalkar, J.; Ali, H.M.; Thomas, S.A. Formulating a Community-Centric Indicator Framework to Quantify One Health Drivers of Antibiotic Resistance: A Preliminary Step towards Fostering ‘Antibiotic-Smart Communities’. Antibiotics 2024, 13, 63.
Abstract
Antibiotic Resistance (ABR) is increasing the mortality and morbidity associated with infectious diseases, besides increasing the cost of healthcare, saturating health-system capacity, and adversely affecting food security. Framing an appropriate narrative and engaging local communities through ‘One Health’ approach is essential to complement the top down measures. However, the absence of objective criteria to measure the performance of ABR interventions at community settings make it difficult to mobilize interest and investment for such interventions. An exercise was therefore done to develop an indicator framework for this purpose. An exhaustive list of indicators was developed from experiences gathered through community engagement work in a local panchayat (small administrative area) in Kerala, India, and a consultative process with health, veterinary, environment, and development experts. A prioritization exercise was done, looking at appropriateness, feasibility and validity, by global experts on ABR. A 15-point indicator framework was designed based on the prioritization process. The final set of indicators covers human health, animal health, environment management and Water Sanitation and hygiene (WASH) domains. The indicator framework was piloted in the panchayat(located in Kerala), which attained a score of 34 (maximum 45). The score increased when interventions were implemented to mitigate the ABR drives, indicating the framework is sensitive to change. Simultaneously, the indicator framework was tested in four sites from three other Indian states with different socioeconomic and health profiles, yielding different scores. Those collecting the field data were able to use it with minimal training. To conclude, this indicator framework can help policymakers broadly understand the factors contributing to ABR and measure the performance of interventions they choose to implement in the community
Keywords
Antibiotic Smart Communities; Indicator framework; WASH; IPC; One Health; ASC
Subject
Public Health and Healthcare, Public, Environmental and Occupational Health
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
