ANTIBIOTICS FOR SINUSITIS

Sinusitis is one of the most widely spread respiratory diseases in the United States. Each year, millions of individuals experience the discomfort of symptoms from some kind of sinus infection.

Symptoms for sinus infection vary depending on the case and severity of your condition. In most cases, these symptoms will include headaches, fever, fatigue, nasal discharge, congestion or blockage. Sinus symptoms can also be caused by colds, allergies and environmental irritants, which are more common than a bacterial sinus infection. That is why some people actually mistake sinusitis as the common cold and don’t really get proper medical treatment for it, thinking that the symptoms will go away and resolve on its own. Other than viral or bacterial causes for sinus infection or symptoms, your living conditions can also contribute to your sinusitis.

Allergens may be present that may trigger sinus problems. If your head aches, you have blockage or congestion in your nasal passages, or you have a runny nose and this goes on for weeks without improvement, it is best to see your doctor and get a proper diagnosis to treat your sinus infection. Your doctor will be able to prescribe you antibiotics that will help you with your symptoms, as needed. An analgesic may also be prescribed at the same time, to aid in your sinusitis treatment if you are feeling too much pain. Some over the counter medicines can also be taken for additional relief or comfort for other symptoms. But in most cases, an antibiotic will do just fine and will work successfully if taken the right way. Antibiotics are usually taken anywhere from 7 to 14 days continuously. The dosage and frequency of your intake would depend on the severity of your symptoms and the kind of infection you have. There are also different ways to take antibiotics. Oral antibiotics are the most commonly prescribed antibiotics.

Although it usually takes time for it to be effective because you have to wait for the medication to circulate your bloodstream before you feel any kind of relief from it. Nebulized antibiotics are getting more and more popular these days. With this type of antibiotic, a nebulizer or inhaler is used to administer the medication. With this method, you inhale the medication through your nose. This allows topical application of the medicine directly onto the infected areas providing a faster and more efficient treatment of your sinus infection. In select cases, the doctor may choose to give you antibiotics intravenously. This method allows the medication to directly enter your bloodstream through a direct injection to your vein and is instantly circulated through your system, giving you faster relief. This type of antibiotic usually lasts 4 – 6 weeks. If you have taken antibiotics according to the instructions given to you by your doctor and there is still no improvement in your condition after 14 days, stop taking any medication and consult your doctor. A different treatment program may be prescribed for you or further tests may be needed to identify the type and severity of your condition.

WHY BACTERIA BECOMES RESISTANT TO ALMOST EVERY TYPE OF ANTIBIOTICS

Since the invention of the microscope, we have realized that in the air that we breed, on the sheets that covers our beds, on the food that we eat, on our skin and evenly inside our bodies lives tiny little creatures, measuring a few micrones, called bacteria. The majority of the bacteria species that surround us are friendly, living in mutualism with human beings. Other (a small number of bacteria species) are pathogenes, living as parasites on/in other living creatures (including humans). Pathogenic bacteria are a major cause of human death and disease, causing infection such as tetanus, typhoid fever, syphilis, leprosy, diphtheria, cholera, foodborne illness and tuberculosis.

Tuberculosis is, in present, the most common bacterial disease. It is caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis. This disease kills every year about 2 million people, mostly in Third World Countries (more exactly in the sub-Saharan- Africa). Other globally spread diseases are pneumonia (caused by bacteria species such as Streptococcus and Pseudomonas) and foodborne illnesses (caused by bacteria species such as Shigella, Campylobacter and Salmonella).

Worldwide, infections produced by bacteria are treated with substances called antibiotics. Exist 2 classes of antibiotics: bacteriocidal (witch kill the bacteria) and bacteriostatic (witch prevent the bacterial growth). The antibiotics are produced nowadays on a large scale using usually aerobic fermentation of different kind of microorganisms. Some newer antibiotics are produced artificially in chemical laboratories, using different biochemical processes.

Antibiotics must be used only with a doctor's prescription, where the dosage and duration of the antibiotic treatment are specified. The following of the prescription and the completion of the entire antibiotic course is extremely important. Not fallowing the doctor prescription facilitates the bacterial populations to become more and more antibiotic resistant. Inappropriate antibiotic treatment (like the use of antibiotics to treat viral infections such as the common cold - that have no effect because the antibiotics doesn't kill viruses) is another form of antibiotic misuse.

So, I hope I've cleared the fact that people contribute on a large scale to the development of antibiotic resistance of the infecting bacteria. The antibiotic resistance has become a serious problem on the entire Globe, not only in developed countries, but also in the undeveloped ones. Because the rate of the antibiotic resistance is so high, low-cost antibiotics are useless for treating the common bacteria infections. This leads to more frequent use of newer and expensive artificial antibiotics, witch in turn leads to the rise of resistance these compounds to.

After you have read this article, you should think twice when you may use antibiotics treatment and when you may not, and also go to your doctor for the prescription and fallow it. Do not use antibiotics when you don't need it!

THE ANTIBIOTIC CRISIS - A LOSS OF - EFFECTIVENESS

It is often suggested we live in a state of fear in modern society. If it isn't one thing, it is another. Global warming, super volcanoes, weapons of mass destruction and so on make one wonder how we've survived this long.
Because of this general state of panic, we often fail to recognize big problems that aren't particularly sexy to the media. One of these problems is the developing crisis regarding the effectiveness of antibiotics. Simply put, they don't work as well as they used to.Viruses and bacteria are becoming resistant to our most common antibiotics. Consider these facts. Of the roughly 100 antibiotics we have, every bacteria strain that causes us illness has developed at least one strain that is resistant to an antibiotic treatment. Nearly 20,000 people die in medical facilities every year from antibiotic resistant bacteria. When it comes to blood poising and pneumonia caused by Staphylococcus aureus, we are down to our last effective antibiotic - Vancomycin.
So, how did we get to this point? Is it just the natural order of things? Well, yes and no. Over time, it is true that bacteria will slowly develop resistances to the drugs used to treat them. The key to that statement, however, is "over time." While we would inevitably expect to have problems, we are having them far too early.
Okay, is there a reason why we are seeing antibiotic resistant strains well before one would expect them? Yes. The problem has to do with our use of antibiotics. Simply put, we treat them as a wonder drug that is good for anything. This is true for both the medical profession and society in general.
In the medical profession, antibiotics are prescribed like candy. Research has shown that they are used by doctors 60 percent more than they should be. Further study has shown the more antibiotics are used, the quicker bacteria develop strains that are resistant to the drugs. In short, we are talking cause and effect.
Ah, but the medical profession is not the only one to blame. Most people are not aware that they are eating antibiotics practically every day. How? Well, they are in the meat products you eat including beef and poultry. They are also in animal products such as milk. These antibiotics are used as a precautionary measure for the animals who are housed in less than stellar conditions.
The biggest scare these days is Vancomycin resistant bacteria. Vancomycin is the antibiotic of last resort for pneumonia and the Staph infection superbug. Cases of bacteria not reacting to the drug are becoming more prevalent all the time. You've probably read about patients dying in the hospital. If this resistance becomes widespread, we have no immediate solutions and a plague of sorts could very well occur. How about that for a state of fear?!

by John Grimes

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