. Many doctors and patients are unaware that antibiotics are designed to treat bacterial infections, not viral infections (Antibiotic resistance, N.D.). Many bacteria within our bodies are not harmful at all, and some of them actually provide health benefits. The bacteria that are harmful are disease-causing bacteria, which generate sicknesses such as strep throat, the common cold, and ear infections (Get, 2013). Viruses are smaller than bacteria and require hosts, such as plants or animals, in order to proliferate (What, N.D.). Doctors play a vital role in administering antibiotics, for patients rely on their knowledge and expertise in order to receive proper medication for ailments throughout their lives. According to www.acponline.org, 190 million doses of antibiotics are administered every day. Among patients that do not reside in hospitals, doctors prescribe more than 133 million antibiotic programs every year. Of those 133 million programs, it is estimated that over 50 percent of them are unnecessarily prescribed because the doctor is prescribing them for viral infections such as common colds or simple coughs (Antibiotic resistance, N.D.). However, doctors are not the only ones to blame in regard to misuse of antibiotics because their patients are just as guilty when it comes to ignorance in respect to antibiotic usage. Many preventable factors have emerged because of irresponsibility of patients, including self-medication practices and the temptations of cheap, counterfeit drugs, all of which have aggravated drug resistance in the last 20 years (What, N.D.). Also, many patients are unaware of the dangers that can result from leaving medication behind because they don’t use it. It is extremely ill-advised to leave behind eve...
... middle of paper ...
...are methods of treatment that can alleviate the severity of the symptoms that come with bronchitis and emphysema. First of all, there are corticosteroids. Corticosteroids can be inhaled, injected, or consumed orally as a pill. They reduce the inflammation of airways, making breathing easier. For acute flares of bronchitis, they are usually injected or given as a pill. Inhalants are often prescribed for daily use because they are effective and are easier to take than injections, which is needed for patients with chronic bronchitis, for those patients fight day to day battles with breathing. Another method of treatment is the use of antibiotics. These are mostly used for acute flare-ups, however, as has previously been discussed, there are many issues regarding the proper distribution and use of antibiotics, and resistance to antibiotics can occur easily and rapidly.
Public health officials estimate that up to 50% of all antibiotics use in the U.S is either unnecessary or in appropriate.
Chronic bronchitis differs from emphysema in that it affects the bronchioles. There are two forms of bronchitis: chronic and acute. We are going to focus on chronic bronchitis. In this disease, the bronchioles become thick and inflamed. The affected person might cough up thick mucus which can also block the bronchioles.
Oxygen, inhaled bronchodilators, inhaled steroids, combination inhalers, oral steroids, phosphodiesterase-4 inhibitors and theophylline are effective medications for COPD (Mayo Clinic, 2016). “Patients with COPD have persistent high levels of CO2, their respiratory centers no longer respond to increased levels of CO2 by stimulating breathing. Therefore, COPD patients with more severe hypoxemia are at higher risk of CO2 retention from uncontrolled CO2 administration” (Van Houten, p. 13). For nurses, “It is important to administer the lowest amount of O2 necessary to patients” (Van Houten, p. 13). Some COPD medicines are used with inhaler and nebulizer devices. It is important to teach patients how to use these devices correctly. (Potter & Perry,
...a are bronchodilators like anticholinergic, beta agonists, theophylline and oxygen, which are for the advance cases of the disease. In addition, the best treatment for people whom have emphysema is for them to stop smoking.
Asthma is treated with two types of medicines: long-term control and quick-relief medicines. Long-term control medicines help reduce airway inflammation and prevent asthma symptoms. Quick-relief, or "rescue," medicines relieve asthma symptoms that may flare up.
Approximately one year ago in Kentucky, a man went to sleep thinking he might have caught a flu. The next day, he is rushed to the local hospital while coughing up chunks of lung tissue; within a few hours he experiences organ failure and lips into a coma. Over the next two days, two other patients come in with the same symptoms and die almost immediately. This epidemic that swept over this small area in Kentucky was an ultra resistant strain of staph infection known as MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (Eisler, 2013). MRSA and other species of resistant bacteria have arisen from the global overuse of antibiotics. Over the years, resistant strains of bacteria have become more and more difficult to fend of using common antibiotic treatments. If something is not done to stop antibiotic resistance, completely resistant strains of bacteria, which we will be unable to kill through use of antibiotics.
It has been suggested that bacterial resistance develops with unnecessary over-prescription, and early termination of antibiotic treatment. O noted that unsupervised self-medication of antibiotics was a key factor in the advancement of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. A recent study revealed alarming use of antibiotics within the developing world. Non-prescription antibiotics have been primarily used to treat cough and influenza, where patients cease medication themselves prior to completion of the course because they fel...
In the last decade, the number of prescriptions for antibiotics has increases. Even though, antibiotics are helpful, an excess amount of antibiotics can be dangerous. Quite often antibiotics are wrongly prescribed to cure viruses when they are meant to target bacteria. Antibiotics are a type of medicine that is prone to kill microorganisms, or bacteria. By examining the PBS documentary Hunting the Nightmare Bacteria and the article “U.S. government taps GlaxoSmithKline for New Antibiotics” by Ben Hirschler as well as a few other articles can help depict the problem that is of doctors prescribing antibiotics wrongly or excessively, which can led to becoming harmful to the body.
Bibliography:.. References 1) Lewis, Ricki, “The Rise of Antibiotic-Resistant Infections”. Food and Drug Administration Publications. http://www.fda.gov/fdac/features/795_antibio.html September, 1995. 2) Levy, S., Bittner, M., and Salyers, A. Ask the Experts about “Ask the Experts”.
The intervention of this study consisted of mailing antibiotic guides to providers along with an antibiotic prescribing profile that targeted infections such as urinary tract infections, lower respiratory tract, and skin infections, and infections of unknown origin. At the end of the study results revealed that non-adherent prescriptions decreased by 20.5% in the experimental group and 5.1% in the controlled group (Monette, et al., 2007). The result of this case showed that education follows with a current antibiotic guide and prescription profile was useful in decreasing the amount of non-adherent prescription of antibiotics in patients that reside in
Acknowledging that the effects of antimicrobial resistance can negatively impact all healthcare settings, proper management over the use of antibiotics is crucial to control the emergence and transmission of antimicrobial-resistant organisms. Requiring every hospital to adopt an antimicrobial stewardship program (ASP) can create an effective way to ensure the appropriate, optimal antibiotic prescribing. The Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) defines the primary purpose of these programs are to enhance clinical outcomes while decreasing unintended consequences of antimicrobial use, including toxicity, the selection of pathogenic organisms, and the emergence of antibiotic resistance (File, Srinivasan, & Bartlett, 2014).
Thesis: With the advent of antibiotics in 1929 Fleming said, "The time may come when penicillin can be bought by anyone in the shops.Then there is the danger that the ignorant man may easily underdose himself and by exposing his microbes to non-lethal quantities of the drug make them resistant."With the overuse of antibiotics today we have seen this very idea come to be.Over usage is caused most prevalently by a lack of education on the part of the patient.Thus stated, the way to overcome such a circumstance is to educate, not only the patient but also the physician.
There is no cure for emphysema but there are many treatments that can help relieve symptoms. The types of treatment are medications, therapy, surgery, and lifestyle and home remedies. Medications such as bronchodilators and inhaled steroids are used to help alleviate the shortness of breath that is caused from emphysema. Antibiotics are also used when emphysema lead to an infection such as bronchitis or pneumonia. Two types of therapy that can be used are pulmonary rehabilitation and nutrition therapy. Pulmonary rehabilitation teaches these patients breathing techniques that can be used to help decrease shortness of breath. Nutrition therapy is used to help these patients learn appropriate nutrition. Depending on the stage of emphysema a patient
Chronic bronchitis is a disorder that causes inflammation to the airway, mainly the bronchial tubules. It produces a chronic cough that lasts three consecutive months for more than two successive years (Vijayan,2013). Chronic Bronchitis is a member of the COPD family and is prominently seen in cigarette smokers. Other factors such as air pollutants, Asbestos, and working in coal mines contributes to inflammation. Once the irritant comes in contact with the mucosa of the bronchi it alters the composition causing hyperplasia of the glands and producing excessive sputum (Viayan,2013). Goblet cells also enlarge to contribute to the excessive secretion of sputum. This effects the cilia that carry out the mechanism of trapping foreign bodies to allow it to be expelled in the sputum, which are now damaged by the irritant making it impossible for the person to clear their airway. Since the mechanism of airway clearance is ineffective, the secretion builds up a thickened wall of the bronchioles causing constriction and increasing the work of breathing. The excessive build up of mucous could set up pneumonia. The alveoli are also damaged enabling the macrophages to eliminate bacteria putting the patient at risk for acquiring an infection.
“An interesting byproduct of the newer solutions to medical dilemmas is the slowly growing resistance of antibiotics in bacteria (“Externalities”, 2016)”. The person who is affected by the negative externality concerning the use of antibiotics by others will see it as lowered utility: either subjective displeasure or potentially explicit costs, such as higher medical expenses in the future to treat infections that could have otherwise been treated easily at a lower cost (Ditah, 2011). In order to mitigate antibiotic resistance, healthcare workers should stop prescribing antibiotics unless it’s truly necessary. Additionally, the government should make more of an effort to tackle antibiotic resistance. People should also be educated about how overuse is