It appears that too many doctors are prescribing antibiotics at the drop of a sneeze. A disturbing study in the journal of the American Medical Association found more than half of patients going to a doctor's office with colds and related infections were given antibiotics. Inappropriate and overuse of antibiotics leads to antibiotic resistant microbes and is a major reason some previously curable infections have turned deadly. Dr Barry Kaufman hasd more.

Colds, along with other upper respiratory infections and bronchitis are most often caused by virus. Antibiotics are powerless against these viral illnesses.

Dr. Ralph Gonzales, U of Colorado Health Sciences Ctr.- "My personal response ways one of alarm and surprise in that we're prescribing antibiotics as frequently as we are for these conditions which they are unlikely to benefit."

Reporting in the Journal of the American Medical Association, a team headed by Dr. Ralph Gonzales found that more than twenty percent of all antibiotic prescriptions for adults were written for patients with colds, upper respiratory infections and bronchitis. Taken together colds and upper respiratory infections are the second and bronchitis the third leading reasons doctors prescribe antibiotics. This amounts to twelve million unnecessary and potentially dangerous prescriptions written each year.

Dr. Gonzales -"Every time we use an antibiotic prescription, there is some chance that we are going to promote or accelerate antibiotic resistance among bacteria that are in our body. What we will find is we will be returning to the pre-antibiotics era, when we didn't have any drugs to treat these infections. The possible scenario of a world in which we have infections with these community bacteria that don't respond to antibiotics is one that is quote frightening."

ANTIBIOTIC OVERUSE WAS SEEN NO MATTER WHAT THE DOCTOR'S SPECIALTY. PATIENTS INSURANCE PLAN, OR PART OF THE COUNTRY, THOUGH RURAL PATIENTS WERE EVEN MORE LIKELY TO GET AN ANTIBIOTIC PRESCRIPTION. THE RESEARCHERS CONCLUDE REDUCING THE MISUSE ANTIBIOTICS RESETA WITH BOTH PHYSICIANS AND PATIENTS.

Dr. Gonzales - "When patients who may want to see a physician because they're worried about having something more serious, such as pneumonia, that at the office visit for that encounter they not pressure the physician to prescribe antibiotics if there is no pneumonia present...And also that physicians and nurses better communicate with patients about what their expectations are and be willing to explain why antibiotics are not indicated or necessary for conditions such as these."

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