Antimicrobial Resistance

Antimicrobial resistance (AR) is one of the most important health security concerns of our time. APHL develops resources and guidance, provides training and educational support and coordinates with clinical laboratories and several public health partners to foster a seamless exchange of specimens and information to combat AR.

Questions?

Contact the Infectious Diseases team: [email protected]

What APHL Does

Supporting Best Practices in AR Testing

APHL supports public health laboratories in combatting AR by assessing capability and capacity, conducting training and liaising with clinical laboratory partners. APHL also participates in multi-organizational efforts to release guidance, develop educational materials for laboratories and sponsors forums for public health and clinical laboratories to foster a seamless exchange of specimens and information.

Best Practice Resources

Guide / Guidance

2024

This document offers guidance for laboratories seeking to implement CPO colonization screening and provides a variety of aspects to consider when implementing testing.

Infectious Diseases, Antimicrobial Resistance

Toolkit

2026

Jointly developed by Together CLSI, APHL, ASM, CAP and CDC, this toolkit is designed to guide performance of a verification or validation study required to update breakpoints.

Infectious Diseases, Antimicrobial Resistance

Toolkit

2021

The toolkit focuses on the verification study needed to update carbapenem susceptibility breakpoints. Carbapenem-resistant organisms (CROs), such as strains of Enterobacterales, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Acinetobacter baumanii.

Infectious Diseases, Antimicrobial Resistance

Interdisciplinary Workgroups

APHL-ASM AR Laboratory Workgroup
Focused on identifying and developing initiatives to improve the detection and reporting of AR while fostering relationships between clinical and public health laboratories. This is a partnership between APHL and ASM with staff and member representation. Several products are provided as resources below.

Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance Task Force (ARSTF)
Focused on building timely and sophisticated systems adequate to support the important task of AR surveillance. ARSTF is a partnership between CDC, CSTE and APHL which has staff and member representation. Learn More.

Council for Outbreak Response: HAI and AR Pathogens (CORHA)
Focused on improving practices for detecting, investigating and controlling healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) and AR. CORHA includes representation from many public health associations including APHL which has staff and member representation. Learn More.

Training

On-Demand

Screening for Resistant Healthcare-associated Infections (HAIs) (4 on-demand modules)
Next Generation Sequencing for Detecting Antimicrobial Resistance Webinar Series (7-part series)
C. auris Training Series (6-part series)

Archived Webinars

More Infectious Diseases Trainings and Events

Visit the APHL Training Hub to search our training materials, access courses through the APHL Learning Center, and find upcoming webinars via the Event Calendar.

Visit the Training Hub

AR Lab Network

APHL supports CDC's Antimicrobial Resistance Laboratory Network (AR Lab Network) through ongoing communication and collaboration amongst all partners including convening meetings, supporting our member laboratories, fellowships and technical assistance (programmatic and informatic).

The AR Lab Network is comprised of 57 member public health laboratories (50 states, five large cities and Puerto Rico and Guam) and seven of the public health laboratories were designated as regional laboratories (listed below) to provide nationwide coverage for complex AR testing. The laboratories use conventional and advanced methods to detect and characterize AR organisms enabling the AR Lab Network to detects trends in resistance and help identify outbreaks of antimicrobial diseases. It also includes the National Tuberculosis Molecular Surveillance Center located at the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services which performs genotyping for all TB cases in the US.

AR Lab Network Regional Laboratories

Fellowships

The Public Health Laboratory Fellowship Program: an APHL-CDC Initiative prepares scientists for careers in public health laboratory science. It is open to recent graduates with a bachelor’s degree or higher and offers an AR focus area that aims to train and prepare recent graduates to apply their scientific expertise to combat AR within public health laboratories and programs. Fellows gain hands-on experience in testing, surveillance and data analysis, contributing to efforts that strengthen the nation’s capacity to detect and respond to resistant pathogens. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis.

LEARN MORE ABOUT OUR FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM

Informatics Support

APHL supports informatics efforts to enhance data exchange across the AR Lab Network by delivering technical assistance to implement national AR reporting from regional, state and local public health laboratories to federal programs.

Visit AR Lab Network Data Exchange

Shipping Support

State, territory and large city public health laboratories that are supported by funding by the AR Lab Network will have access to the funded FedEx account. This account may be used for shipping and includes the shipping of isolates, samples and supplies between clinical laboratories, non-regional laboratories, regional laboratories and CDC.

Guidance for Use of the AR Lab Network FedEx Account

Hear from Us!

Visit the AR Lab Network Newsletter to read previous issues and subscribe for updates on our projects, resources and news from our community.

Read the latest issue:

Join our Community

The purpose of this community is to increase collaboration, knowledge sharing and improved troubleshooting on AR topics. Ask questions. Share your expertise. Interact with your peers. Give advice. Share resources and best practices. Be sure to contact your community manager(s) if you have any questions/concerns.

AR Lab Network ColLABorate Community

AR Lab Network Think Tank

The AR Lab Network Think Tank is a curated collection of resources designed to foster idea-sharing and collaboration across the network. It brings together a diverse assortment of tools and resources developed by a small group of public health laboratories to strengthen communication with their clinical and laboratory partners.

Beyond the Public Health Laboratory

Colonization Screening for Multidrug-Resistant Organisms in Healthcare Facilities

Brought to you by the Association of Public Health Laboratories and the Antimicrobial Resistance Laboratory Network (AR Lab Network) these learning resources were created to assist staff at health care facilities understand the role of colonization screening for carbapenemase-producing organisms (CPOs) and Candida auris.

Continuing education credit is not available for these learning resources. If you are based in the US and need credit for course completion or are interested in courses offering CEU please proceed to the APHL Learning Center.

Module 1: Overview and Importance of Screening for Multidrug-resistant Organisms (MDROs)
Module 2: Carbapenemase-producing Organisms Colonization Screening
Module 3: Candida auris Colonization Screening
Module 4: Video-Packaging and Shipping for Colonization Screening

LEARN AND GROW

AR News and Events

Lab Culture News article

03.28.25

Co-infections are cause for alarm, and some can create serious public health challenges—especially when antimicrobial resistance (AR) enters the equation.

Infectious Diseases, Antimicrobial Resistance

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