Cost of inappropriate use of ciprofloxacin in ambulatory care.
To determine the incidence of inappropriate ciprofloxacin use and the resulting cost thereof in ambulatory care. Retrospective cost analysis. Ambulatory care clinic of a Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center. One hundred thirty-seven ambulatory patients prescribed ciprofloxacin during March, April, and May 1992. Forty-six patient charts were available for review. Indications for ciprofloxacin use were determined from chart review. Chart review of 46 of the 137 patients prescribed ciprofloxacin during the three-month study period indicated that only 8 (17 percent) had infections that were appropriately treated with this antibiotic. If 550 patients had received ciprofloxacin that year (figure extrapolated from the three-month totals), the cost of prescribing would have been $29,260. This study indicates that $20,500 per year could be saved by prescribing equally efficacious oral antibiotics. Restricting ciprofloxacin use to its proven indications in the ambulatory setting may result in considerable cost savings to medical centers.