About us

The Control and Response Strategies (CSR) unit provides countries with guidance, tools and technical support to monitor and evaluate patterns of antimicrobial use in all settings and use the data to develop, implement and assess antimicrobial stewardship interventions and policies to improve antimicrobial use.

These activities are intended to promote the appropriate use of antimicrobials nationally and globally and curb the further emergence and spread of antimicrobial resistance.

Initiatives lead by the CSR unit include:

Antimicrobial use surveillance:

• Surveillance of antimicrobial use as part of the Global Antimicrobial Resistance and Use Surveillance System (GLASS-AMU)

  Provides a standardized system for countries to collect, analyse, interpret and share national level data on the use of antimicrobials.

• GLASS guide to using surveillance data on antimicrobial use

  Provides guidance and practical examples on the way in which antimicrobial use surveillance data can be used to inform national antimicrobial policies and facility antimicrobial stewardship interventions.

• Point Prevalence Survey (PPS) on antimicrobial use in hospitals

  Provides a standardized methodology to monitor antimicrobial use at the patient level to identify priority areas for improvement and to evaluate the impact of antimicrobial stewardship interventions.

• Capacity building in antimicrobial use surveillance

On request of countries and regions, the CSR unit provides education, training and resources for countries and regions to strengthen national antimicrobial use surveillance systems.

Antimicrobial stewardship:

• AWaRe system

Develops and regularly updates the AWaRe classification of antibiotics for evaluation and monitoring of use and the AWaRe antibiotic book which provides guidance on the management of common clinical infections in children and adults.

• Antimicrobial stewardship practical toolkit

Provides guidance and practical tools for the implementation of antimicrobial stewardship interventions in various settings.

• Indicators and targets for antimicrobial use

Develops context- and disease-specific indicators and targets for antimicrobial use to benchmark antimicrobial use within and between countries.

• Capacity building in antimicrobial stewardship

On request of countries and regions, the CSR unit provides education, training and resources for countries and regions to implement antimicrobial stewardship interventions.