Antibiotic resistance in small animal veterinary practice: veterinary nurses as antibiotic guardians

During the mid-1800s, Louis Pasteur led the medical profession in the discovery of microbes as a cause of disease and introduced the principles of aseptic technique with the suggestion that ‘instead of fighting bacteria, would it not just be better not to introduce them?’ After the discovery of antibiotics in 1945, this focus on prevention measures seemingly lapsed due to the apparent ease in which infections could be treated, but with the emergence of antibiotic resistance in the late 20th and early 21st centuries and no new antibiotics on the horizon, infection prevention is at the forefront once again (Verwilghen and Singh, 2015).

In parallel to the human healthcare profession, multidrug resistant bacterial infections are an important problem within veterinary medicine. Currently, the major organisms of concern include meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus pseudintermedius (MRSP), meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), extended-spectrum β-lactamase (ESBL) Escherichia coli, enterococci and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (Guardabassi and Prescott, 2015). The close relationship between pets and owners has also raised concerns regarding interspecies transmission of resistant bacteria. Antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria isolated from small animals often are indistinguishable from strains isolated from people caring for these animals; O'Mahony et al (2005) identified that the most frequently occurring pattern of MRSA in veterinary sources was the same as the most prevalent strain identified in the human population. Responsible antibiotic use in both fields is therefore important to help preserve the efficacy of antibiotics for humans and animals alike.