• Nasser Mostafavi, Arash Rashidian, Akram Karimi-Shahanjarini, Ardeshir Khosravi, and Roya Kelishadi.
• Department of Pediatric Infectious Diseases, Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine Research Center, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.
• J Res Med Sci. 2015 May 1; 20 (5): 429-33.

BackgroundTo investigate the prevalence of antibiotic usage in children aged <5 years with acute respiratory tract illness (ARTI) in Iran.Materials And MethodsData were collected from a national health survey conducted in 2010 (Iran's Multiple Indicator Demographic and Health Survey). Participants of this cross-sectional study were selected by multistage stratified cluster-random sampling from 31 provinces of Iran. Parents of children with <5 years of age responded to questions about the occurrence of any cough during the previous 2 weeks, referral to private/governmental/other health care systems, and utilization of any oral/injection form of antibiotics. Data were analyzed using SPSS software18. The chi-square test was used to determine antibiotic consumption in various gender and residency groups and also a place of residence with the referral health care system.ResultsOf the 9345 children under 5 years who participated in the study, 1506 cases (16.2%) had ARTI during 2 weeks prior to the interview, in whom 1143 (75.9%) were referred to urban or rural health care centers (43.4 vs. 30.4%; P < 0.001). Antibiotics were utilized by 715 (62.6%) of affected children. Injection formulations were used for 150 (13.1%) patients. The frequency of receiving antibiotics was higher in urban than in rural inhabitants (66.0% vs. 57.7% P < 0.05).ConclusionThe prevalence of total and injection antibiotics usage in children <5 years with ARTI is alarmingly high in Iran. Therefore, interventions to reduce antibiotic use are urgently needed.

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