Deanna McDanel, clinical associate professor in the Department of Pharmacy Practice and Science, received top honors for the poster titled, "The Effectiveness of a Best Practice Advisory to Determine True Beta-Lactam Allergy and Promote Antibiotic Stewardship in Orthopedic Surgery," at the Fourth Annual Quality Improvement and Patient Safety Symposium on April 6. She served as the lead author for the poster, which also included collaborators from University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics (UIHC)/Carver College of Medicine - Amber Harleem, Nicolas Noiseux, and Amy Dowden.

The poster discusses research related to the Drug Allergy Clinic, established in 2013 at UIHC. The clinic works with the orthopedics department to evaluate patients prior to having surgery, if they have reported a history of a beta-lactam allergy (HOBA) to a penicillin or cephalosporin. The goal of the clinic is to determine the true presence of a drug allergy in these patients in order to select a surgical prevention antibiotic. 

The purpose of the McDanel's study was to determine the effectiveness of implementing a simple best practice advisory method to enable screening of orthopedic pre-surgical patients with HOBA.  

The study found that 99 percent of patients evaluated (via skin testing) with HOBA were not truly allergic and the use of the standard surgical prophylaxis with cefazolin was deemed safe in the 97 percent of patients evaluated. 

Her poster was selected as one of the top three by faculty and staff out of a field of 76 poster entries.