Ensure that you complete the antibiotic dose to reduce the chances of re-occurrences. Antibiotic drugs are the most effective remedies for bacterial infections.
They may slow down the growth of the microorganisms or completely kill them. How exactly does this happen? Depending on the type of drug, antibiotic medication can work by:. Taking antibiotic medication for an extended period can increase your chances of suffering from unwanted side effects.
Doctors previously prescribed antibiotics for long-term use. Health care providers previously thought that patients needed to use medications for a longer time for bacteria to be eliminated. However, clinical research studies have established that using antibiotic medication over a long period of time is actually harmful. It should be noted that the body hosts other beneficial bacteria.
So, what happens when you take antibiotics for longer? The harmful bacteria will first get eliminated. Then, the beneficial bacteria in your body will also get destroyed. This will definitely cause interference in the normal functioning of the body system.
Generally, over-treating bacterial infections are harmful. As a matter of fact, this scenario will result in severe health problems. The eventual effect is antibiotic resistance.
Note: Doctors have to be careful when writing a prescription. As much as short-term use of antibiotics is good, they should also not under-prescribe it. In case this happens, the patient will not be fully treated. Besides that, the level of infectious bacteria will increase significantly.
Once you complete an under-dose, the chances are that you will end up with a more severe infection. This usually occurs when the bacteria evolves and becomes stronger. As a result, it becomes impossible to control antibiotic resistance by taking antibiotics.
Keep in mind that some conditions are entirely untreatable. Research studies indicate that millions of people suffer and die annually as a result of antibiotic resistance. These are infections that are resistant to antibiotic treatment:. You can under- or over-treat yourself with antibiotics. We just feel bad. This can be confusing because, for example, while a cold virus attacks our body, our immune system is working extra hard and we become vulnerable to developing other types of infections, such as pneumonia or strep throat, which are bacterial infections and usually treated with antibiotics.
Scientists have found evidence that humans may have used antibiotic agents against disease as far back as 2, years ago. In , Dr. Alexander Fleming returned to his lab following a vacation to find that a type of fungus called penicillium had contaminated one of the petri dishes containing a bacterium he had been studying staphylococci. The bacteria all around the fungal mould had died.
Fleming then analyzed the mould and found that it produced a chemical substance that killed bacteria, which he named penicillin. Several other scientists ran with that initial discovery, refining the process and applying it to medicine as a mass-produced medication. There are now dozens of types of penicillins as well as numerous other chemical classes of antibiotics.
Bacteria are single-celled microorganisms microbes. The human body hosts trillions of microbes, with an estimated 10, bacterial species living in and on the surface of our bodies. No two people — not even twins — have identical combinations of bacteria microbiomes , which begin to develop at birth, particularly if we were born through the microbe-rich birth canal. For a long time, scientists focussed only on infection-causing pathogenic bacteria and thought that non-pathogenic bacteria were, at best, unimportant.
However, microbial cells outnumber our human cells by about ten to one and scientists are now beginning to understand that they play a significant role in our wellness, especially within the immune and digestive systems. In digestion, for example, there are bacteria that feed on foods that we cannot digest with our human cells alone. The waste products of these bacteria are nutrients for our human systems.
Probiotics refer to live microorganisms thought to have beneficial effects, and popular knowledge of this has led to a surge in probiotic use; however, other bacteria have harmful effects, especially when they overpopulate specific areas of our bodies. Some bacteria may be less affected than others and may take longer to be adversely affected by the antibiotic. Bacteria such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa cause infections that are notoriously difficult to treat, and these infections may be slow to respond to antibiotic treatment even if the most appropriate antibiotic is used.
Each of the bacteria causing your illness contributes to your feeling unwell. The fewer remaining, the better you are going to start to feel. But feeling unwell is not just down to the bacteria. Your body responds to infection by mounting an immune response.
This may be directed at the infecting bacteria, to any of your own tissue that has been damaged by the infection, or both, all of which leaves you feeling generally unwell. So, while antibiotics attack the underlying cause of the infection, there are other things going on too. Read more: Explainer: how does the immune system work? Even once the antibiotics have started work on the bacteria, your body has to tidy up the aftermath of the infection. These are produced by all Gram-negative bacteria with exception of Salmonella and Klebsiella.
They are not inhibited by clavulanate[ 25 , 26 ]. Oxacillin-hydrolyzing enzymes confer resistance to penicillin, cloxacillin, oxacillin, and methicillin. They are weakly inhibited by clavulanic acid but are inhibited by sodium chloride. AG are neutralized by specific enzymes: Phosphoryl-transferases, nucleotidyl-transferases or adenylyl-transferases, and AACs.
These aminoglycoside-modifying enzymes AMEs reduce affinity of a modified molecule, impede binding to the 30S ribosomal subunit,[ 28 ] and provide extended spectrum resistance to AG's and FQ. Few Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria and some of Haemophilus influenzae strains are resistant to chloramphenicol, and they have an enzyme chloramphenicol transacetylase that acetylates hydroxyl groups of chloramphenicol.
Modified chloramphenicol is unable to bind to a ribosomal 50S subunit properly. Resistance mechanism of various antibiotics is described in Table 1.
The discovery of antibiotics led to sigh of relief, that now no bacteria will reside in this planet. With time, the bacteria have become smarter, and along with it, massive usage of antibiotics in clinical practice has resulted in resistance of bacteria to antimicrobial agents. Better understanding of the mechanisms of antibiotic resistance, will help clinicians regarding usage of antibiotics in different situations.
National Center for Biotechnology Information , U. J Anaesthesiol Clin Pharmacol. Author information Copyright and License information Disclaimer. Address for correspondence: Dr. E-mail: moc. This article has been cited by other articles in PMC. Abstract Infections account for a major cause of death throughout the developing world. Keywords: Antibiotics, antimicrobial resistance, bacterial cell wall, mechanism of action.
Introduction The struggle of mankind against infectious diseases is well known. Basic Anatomy of Bacterial Cell The Gram-positive bacteria consists of cytoplasmic membrane surrounded by a tough and rigid mesh called cell wall. Open in a separate window. Figure 1. Classification of Antibiotics on the Basis of Mechanism of Action The antibiotics are classified on the basis of mechanism of action as described in Figure 2. Figure 2.
Antibiotics targeting cell wall Bacterial cells are surrounded by a cell wall made of peptidoglycan, which consists of long sugar polymers. Figure 3. Glycopeptides The glycopeptides binds to D-alanyl D-alanine portion of peptide side chain of the precursor peptidoglycan subunit. Figure 4. Inhibitors of 30S subunit Aminoglycosides The aminoglycosides AG's are positively-charged molecules which attach to the OM which is negatively charged leading to formation of large pores, and thus allow antibiotic penetration inside the bacterium.
Tetracyclines Tetracyclines, such as tetracycline, chlortetracycline, doxycycline, or minocycline, act upon the conserved sequences of the 16S r-RNA of the 30S ribosomal subunit to prevent binding of t-RNA to the A site. Inhibitors of 50S subunit Chloramphenicol It interacts with the conserved sequences of the peptidyl transferase cavity of the 23S r-RNA of the 50S subunit. Oxazolidinones Linezolid is a recently approved member of novel class of antibiotic of this group which is completely synthetic.
Folic acid metabolism inhibitors Sulfonamides and trimethoprim Each of these drugs inhibits distinct steps in folic acid metabolism. Mechanisms of Antimicrobial Resistance Prevention of accumulation of antimicrobials either by decreasing uptake or increasing efflux of the antimicrobial from the cell i.
Efflux pumps Membrane proteins that export antibiotics from the cell and maintain their low-intracellular concentrations are called efflux pumps. Modification of target molecule Natural variations or acquired changes in the target sites of antimicrobials that prevent drug binding is a common mechanism of resistance. Chloramphenicol-acetyl-transferases Few Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria and some of Haemophilus influenzae strains are resistant to chloramphenicol, and they have an enzyme chloramphenicol transacetylase that acetylates hydroxyl groups of chloramphenicol.
Table 1 Resistance mechanism of individual antibiotics. Conclusion The discovery of antibiotics led to sigh of relief, that now no bacteria will reside in this planet. Financial support and sponsorship Nil. Conflicts of interest There are no conflicts of interest.
References 1. Hauser AR, editor.
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