Bristol team to help in the fight against superbugs

Researchers
at the University of Bristol have received £1.5 million from the National
Institute for Health Research (NIHR) for a trial looking at easing the pain of
ear infections. This is part of a larger investment of over £15.8 million into
research to tackle into drug resistant infections by the NIHR, the research arm
of the NHS.

Sixteen studies have been funded as part of a call for more research into drug
resistant infections also known as antimicrobial resistance (AMR).
Drug-resistant infections present a major threat to the future of healthcare
and could result in 10 million avoidable deaths in the world every year by
2050, from antibiotic resistant infections, such as MRSA, sepsis and multi-drug-resistant
Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

The Bristol trial, CEDAR, will involve 500 children participating in a study to
find out whether eardrops containing a combined local anaesthetic and
painkiller can ease the pain of ear infections.

Professor Alastair Hay, from the Centre for Academic Primary Care in the university’s School
of Social and Community Medicine, is leading the study. He is also Director of the Respiratory Infections Health Integration Team. He said:

“Antibiotics are not painkillers, and they do not treat the worst symptom of
ear infections: the child’s ear pain. This study will give us a unique
opportunity to test a new way of helping families to manage the distress and
disruption caused by children’s ear pain.”

Antibiotics are prescribed to a higher proportion of children with middle ear
infections than any other respiratory infection of childhood, in spite of world
class evidence that they are rarely effective. Alternative treatments are
urgently needed given the serious concerns about increasing resistance to
antibiotics. Find out more about the
CEDAR trial.

Professor Dame Sally C Davies, Chief Medical Officer and Chief Scientific
Adviser at the Department of Health said:

“Antimicrobial resistance is a very
serious problem for society causing 5,000 deaths in the UK each year. We will
lose this battle unless we get more evidence on how to prevent resistance in
bacteria developing. That is why the research that the NIHR has committed to
funding is so vital. This will help us stop current everyday health problems
becoming fatal.”

Other projects underway include research into interventions to improve
antimicrobial prescribing of doctors in training, using probiotics to reduce
infections in care homes, a clinical trial giving painkillers to children with
ear infections instead of antibiotics, and a study looking at improving the
management of drug resistant TB.