Clinical Studies : High Dose Tigecycline Essay

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.

Although declining, inappropriate antibiotic prescribing continues to be a problem, especially the use of broad-spectrum antibiotics for infections of predominantly viral etiology, increasing risk for developing drug-resistant infection complications (Aspinall, Good, Metlay, Mor, & Fine, 2008; Garau & Dagan, 2003). Few interventions have been effective in moderating antibiotic overuse for acute URTIs (Legare et al., 2012). Emphasis on infection control alone is inadequate to address the rise of resistant infections. Judicious prescribing is the

Tetracyclines and erythromycin are the most commonly used oral antimicrobials. In many cases, long-term treatment is needed to maintain remission. The long-term use of antimicrobials is not well tolerated, however, because of side-effects, including gastrointestinal intolerance,

Adult patients (>18 years) having a primary diagnosis for bacteremia [International Classification of Diseases, 9th Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM) codes 790.7] or septicemia [Clinical Classification Code (CCS) 003.1, 020.2, 022.3, 036.2, 038.0, 038.1, 038.10-038.12, 038.19, 038.2, 038.3, 038.40-038.44, 038.49, 038.8, 038.9, 054.5, 449, 771.81, 995.91, 995.92, 790.7] caused by any organism between 2010 and 2012 will be included for the analysis.47 Antibiotic therapy for each

Antibiotics are usually prescribed for non-specific upper respiratory tract infection to avoid small risks for getting worst and becoming bacterial infection. Patients with acute respiratory infection with antibiotic treatment were not at increased risk for severe adverse effect and had a small decreased risk of hospitalization due to pneumonia (Meropol, Localio, & Metlay, 2013). Similarly, presence of risk factors such as age > 65, COPD, diabetes, heart failure, atherosclerotic heart disease, asthma, smoking, etc. had similar prescription rate of 62% to those patients without risk factors (Grover, Mookadam, Rutkowski, Cullan, Hill, Patchett & Noble, 2012).

Piperacillin is indicated in the treatment of serious infections due to susceptible organisms, such as Respiratory tract infection (REF 14). When combined with tazobactam, piperacillin is indicated to treat pneumonia caused by piperacillin-resistant, beta-lactamase-producing bacteria (REF 14). Mr. Kostas was prescribed this medication because his test results led to Dr. Jones’ suspicion of an infective exacerbation of the patient’s chronic bronchitis. The patient’s high temperature and elevated WBC count indicate Mr. Kostas is fighting an infection (REF

*Tigecycline (TIG), a derivative of minocycline, overcomes most of the known tetracycline resistance mechanisms. The discovery of TIG represented significant progress, because it is active against a wide spectrum of Gram negative and Gram positive pathogens, especially multidrug-resistant strains. Tigecycline, similar to tetracycline shows antibiotic properties, but is not affected by tetracycline resistance mediated by efflux or ribosomal protection proteins. This allows TIG to evade the common ribosomal protection mechanisms associated with resistance to

Infections are the major causes of mortality and morbidity in the intensive care unit (ICU). More than 50% of patients admitted to ICU were infected, 71% of these patients received antibiotic Infections increase with long stays in the ICU. The infection rates more than 70% in patients stay more than 7 days. (1)

Legionnaires’ disease can be treated with antibiotics and can be very successful if started early on. The sooner antibiotic treatment is administered, the smaller the chance of serious complications. In most cases, treatment of a Legionella pneumophila infection involves hospitalization. An antibiotic such as a broad-spectrum cephalosporin along with a macrolide or a quinolone is the recommended treatment for those hospitalized with Legionnaires’ disease. Other effective antibiotics include tetracyclines and ketolides. The antibiotics used most frequently have been erythromycin, levofloxacin, doxycycline, and azithromycin. These antibiotics are the most effective because they have good intracellular penetration into Legionella-infected

Antibiotics are prescribed at more than 100 million adult ambulatory care visits annually, and 41% of these prescriptions are for respiratory conditions. However, this is not typically the best treatment and increase the chances of negative effects such as antibiotic resistance, increased cost, and adverse effects. Antibiotics are also responsible for the largest number of medication-related adverse events, implicated in 1 of every 5 visits to emergency departments for adverse drug reactions. The reasoning for this comes from determining if the respiratory infection is bacterial or viral. Antibiotics are used to treat bacterial infections and have no use.

The decisions to prescribe antibiotics are reliant on clinical examination of symptoms such as fever, sputum discoloration and breathlessness.4 In modern society, no clinical test can produce a flawless diagnosis. However, in an appropriate clinical context, point of care (POC) biomarkers can guide the clinician in determining antibiotic treatment in specific cases, by eliminating severe bacterial infections and identifying patient’s who will not benefit from antibiotics. The systematic review, “Biomarkers as point-of-care tests to guide prescription of antibiotics in patients with acute respiratory infections in primary care,” analysed the research of six studies, to assess whether POC biomarkers integrated with clinical examination is an

Intravenous antibiotics that include coverage for anaerobic species recommended for patients with life-threatening spread of infection or sepsis

FILE T.M., J. SEGRETI, L. DUNBAR, R. PLAYER, R. KOHLER, R. REX WILLIAMS, C. KOJAK, A. RUBIN. 1997. A Multicenter Randomized Study Comparing the Efficacy and Safety of Intravenous and/or Oral Levofloxacin versus Ceftriaxone and/or Cefuroxime Axetil in Treatment of Adults with Community-Acquired Pneumonia. Antimicrobial Agents & Chemotherapy, 41(9), pp 1965-72.

According to CDC and EMA statistic the annual death toll due to multi-drug resistant bacterial infections is estimated at 23,000 in the US and 25,000 in Europe (Aminor). Western medicine depends on antibiotics for everyday illnesses but, antibiotics are becoming a serious issue for future healthcare. The United States is being propelled into an era of medicine where the effectiveness of antibiotics is rapidly declining. “In the United States, methicillin-resistant S.aureus (MRSA) infections alone account for more deaths than HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis combined” (Abedon). Investing in alternate approaches to medical treatment is necessary and because of that bacteriophage therapy is starting to gain interest. The problem that arises is that

Drug delivery is the process by which a pharmaceutical drug is delivered to the patient to provide medical treatment to ameliorate the well-being of the patient and prolong their lifespan. While pharmaceutical drugs have shown to be of great aid in the treatment of patients injecting foreign compounds throughout the entire body can be hazardous and cause unforeseen consequences. The side effects of some drugs are can prove to be life-threatening if consumed irregularly and even under the best conditions drugs can still have nasty side-effects. To try and solve this issue biomedical engineers have designed several drug delivery systems to combat this issue. There were three main factors that were considered to minimize the damage done by pharmaceutical drugs. The first thing that was needed to be done was to increase the drug acting period and this was generally achieved by linking the drug with macromolecules or encapsulating the drug within a polymer. The next major contribution was to enhance the targeting ability of the drug so the drug found the site of action instead of spreading itself randomly throughout the body; this was done mainly through the use of linking the drug with an antibody and ligand so it would react to the a certain type of cell as well as avoid natural defenses placed by the host’s body. After the drug reached the site of action the release of the drug needed to be controlled at the action site (such as tissues/organs) and this was done through