Developing a visual learning tool to aid the studying of antimicrobial spectrum of activity

Background: As a general principal in antimicrobial therapy, the goal is to administer an antibiotic with the narrowest spectrum of activity that would be capable of affecting a particular microorganism when the identity is known. But in many cases, patients are treated empirically with an antimicrobial which has a broad spectrum of activity until the laboratory results identify the pathogenic microorganism. Therefore it is fundamental to have the knowledge of antibiotics' spectrum of activity when treating infectious diseases. One of the main areas of difficulty for teaching and learning antimicrobial pharmacology is mastering the spectrum of activity of antimicrobial drugs. We aim to remedy this and strengthen the knowledge of antimicrobial pharmacology needed for the treatment of infectious diseases.