4 Jul 2022
More than 900 cases required from primary care vets in UK for study aiming to help avoid unnecessary use and help to tackle antimicrobial resistance.
Paul Imrie
Job Title
Fergus Allerton, European veterinary specialist in small animal internal medicine at Willows Veterinary Centre and Referral Service, and AMR lead at veterinary group Linnaeus.
Primary care vets in the UK are being asked for help with a study into use of antibiotics for treating canine urinary tract infections (UTIs).
The study is aiming to find the optimum length of antibiotic treatment for UTIs to avoid unnecessary use and help to tackle antimicrobial resistance (AMR).
The Stop on Sunday (SOS) project is focusing on female dogs aged between 6 months old and 10 years old with a presumptive diagnosis of UTI. The trial will be comparing various treatment durations of three, four, five, six and seven-day courses of antibiotic amoxicillin-clavulanate.
Led by Fergus Allerton, European veterinary specialist in small animal internal medicine at Willows Veterinary Centre and Referral Service, the study is seeking more than 900 cases.
Its name highlights how different treatment durations of cases are assigned so they finish on a Sunday and owners can update participating vets on the Monday after the antibiotic course ends.
Vets for participating cases can then reassess them on the Monday to ensure the dog still receives the right level of treatment and support. Any clinical information can then be inputted into a data capture system that will also email owners to collect follow-up data should recurrences happen.
Mr Allerton, who is also AMR lead for Linnaeus and involved in the PROTECT ME initiative to encourage rational antibiotic use, said: “Treatment recommendations should be based on concrete evidence that improves the care we provide and reduces the risk of unnecessary antibiotic use. Evidence around antibiotic course duration is sorely lacking, but is essential for us address the threat of AMR.
“We are aiming to gather more than 900 cases to provide robust evidence for the study, so we need as many vets as possible to share their data and contribute to this vital research. If you see these cases and would like to help in the fight against AMR, please get in touch.
“Input to the study counts towards annual CPD requirements and there will be further opportunities to contribute, such as data analysis and manuscript preparation.”
The SOS trial, which is supported by the Small Animal Medicine Society, has ethical approval and an animal test certificate.
To be part of the study, email Mr Allerton.
To view the full protocol, visit the information published at BMC Veterinary Research.
