Event

Canadian Roundtable on Antimicrobial Stewardship

Toronto: June 16-17, 2016

Co-hosts: NCCID and HealthCareCAN

Facilitator:  Dorothy Strachan, Strachan-Tomlinson

Summary: Over 50 “Champions of Change”—experts, key influencers and stakeholders in the fields of antimicrobial stewardship and resistance—gathered to help build a national action plan for antimicrobial stewardship (AMS). (A draft action plan will be posted soon). Discussion began with certain assumptions about what would make for an effective AMS action plan. That is, the plan should align with global and federal AMS efforts, cross institutional and community settings, and aim for better cooperation among human health, animal health and environmental initiatives. Because antimicrobial resistance is a serious threat to public health, participants called for concrete and actionable steps.

Over the day and a half, Roundtable participants outlined many concrete steps that can be taken to develop, implement and monitor AMS programs in communities and in hospitals in Canada. The event encouraged consensus on basic priorities, identified opportunities for collaboration and specific commitments, and explored potential funding sources, governance options, and policy levers that could support more coordinated AMS efforts in Canada. See the meeting report for more details.

Roundtable objectives:

  1. Gather the information required to inform the development of a Canadian Action Plan;
  2. Link domestic and international AMS efforts;
  3. Identify key leaders and related accountabilities for the AMS post-Roundtable Action Plan, including commitments to new benchmarks and targets; and
  4. Continue to build community awareness and a common language in support of implementing the AMS Action Plan.

Speakers:

  • Gregory Taylor, Chief Public Health Officer for Canada
  • Andrew Morris, Director ASP, Mount Sinai Hospital ‐ University Health Network
  • David Patrick, Medical and Epidemiology Lead, AMR and Do Bugs Need Drugs Program, BC Centre for Disease Control
  • John Conly, Lead for the Alberta Health Services Regional AMS Program
  • Arjun Srinivasan, Associate Director for Healthcare‐Associated Infection Prevention Programs, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
  • Stephan Harbarth, Section Head, Infection Control Programme, University Hospitals of Geneva

Background / further reading: