Syndromic Testing and Antimicrobial Stewardship (FutureLearn)

You’ll use clinical case studies to better understand the real-life application of the syndromic testing system and learn about the medical indications which align with a syndromic approach.

Understand the use of syndromic testing for infectious disease diagnosis and its role in AMS
Rapid syndromic testing aims to speed up the medical diagnosis of defined infectious diseases.
In a hospital setting, this is key to improving patient outcomes and has been shown by numerous studies to be cost-effective and clinically useful.
Under the guidance of experts at BSAC, you’ll learn how to identify clinical conditions which require rapid syndromic testing and analyse its role in antimicrobial stewardship.

Explore rapid syndromic testing as a point-of-care diagnosis tool
When it comes to antimicrobial stewardship, rapid syndromic testing tools have been shown to improve patient care for those that test positive, with shorter courses of antibiotics recorded when compared to diagnosis delivered by standard testing methods.
You’ll explore the opportunities and challenges of using syndromic testing as a rapid treatment response.
By the end of the course, you’ll understand the value of syndromic testing in practice and how it can impact existing antimicrobial stewardship programs.

What will you achieve?
By the end of the course, you‘ll be able to...

• Explore the syndromic approach to medical diagnosis
• Identify clinical conditions which necessitate rapid Syndromic testing
• Evaluate the role Syndromic testing plays in AMS programs
• Assess the benefits and hurdles of rapid Syndromic testing as a Point of Care diagnostic testing tool
• Identify the great value Syndromic testing has in real-life clinical scenarios