Antibiotic treatment – How long is short enough?

You have probably learned at some time in your life that completing whole antibiotic courses prevents bacteria from becoming resistant.

While this is true for infections with microbes such as Mycobacterium tuberculosis, for a majority of other infectious agents, such practice is debatable. Prolonging antibiotic exposure may actually increase the selection pressure for antibiotic resistance. In this video Dr Dag Berild discusses numerous randomized control studies indicating that, for a range of common infections, short treatments have not been inferior to long treatments.

You will find the pdf for the cited articles in the downloads section below.

In the comments below:

Discuss how you perceive prescription practices where you live.

We encourage you to interact with other learners by ‘liking’ and replying!