Page 4 - NATIONAL ANTIBIOTIC RESISTANCE SURVEILLANCE REPORT 2021

Executive summary

The surveillance data was analyzed based on the antibiotic susceptibility testing

of bacteria, isolated from clinical samples of patients admitted to participating
hospitals. A total of 533101 isolates were reported in 41 hospitals and 1 public

health laboratory. However, based on the first isolate per patient, only 249311

isolates were analyzed for NSAR 2021. Thirty-nine of the hospital microbiology
laboratories were government hospitals and 2 were from university hospitals.

These hospitals were distributed in all 13 states in Malaysia. The data was

collected from January until December 2021. The analysis was carried out using
the WHONET 2019 software, whenever there are 30 or more isolates. The

percentage of resistance may be high in instances where the numbers of isolates

tested were low. The interpretive criteria for susceptibility or resistance were as
outlined by CLSI Performing Standards for Antimicrobial Susceptibility testing

guideline. When the interpretation zones were not available in the CLSI, the

EUCAST guidelines were referred to.

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