Pneumonia patients who follow a full 10-day prescribed course of antibiotics are taking more medication than is necessary, a Dutch team of researchers said yesterday.
The standard recommended treatment for common pneumonia, the world over currently, is a course of 7 to 10 days of antibiotics. However, there is little medical evidence to say the treatment requires as many days. The team of researchers led by Dr Jan Prins of the Academic Medical Centre's Department of Internal Medicine in Amsterdam, said a short course of three days would be just as effective.
In addition, a shorter course of antibiotics could also help reduce the resistance rates. It is normally found that bacteria develop a resistance to drugs resulting in the infection lasting longer; in some cases the patient even stops responding to treatment after some time.
The Dutch team followed the progress of 119 adult patients in the Netherlands. These patients were admitted in nine different hospitals for common pneumonia with severity ranging from mild to moderate-severe. They were put on intravenous amoxicillin for the first three days and then separated into different groups. Day 4 onwards, each group was given either oral amoxicillin or a placebo for five days.
Of patients treated for 3 to 8 days, 93 percent reported improvement. Patients who responded well to three days of amoxicillin, continued recovering even after treatment was stopped and “the results were comparable for those treated for eight days," lead researcher Prins said.
The benefits of 3-day treatment did not end there. On the 28th day, the improvement was 90 percent compared to the 88 percent effectiveness seen in the group given the 8-day treatment. The pattern of recovery as well as the duration of hospital stay was similar to both groups
Although a shorter course of antibiotics is effective in both children and adults, the same should not be assumed for other conditions, Prins advices.
His advice echoes the opinion of other medical experts who say that research has been insufficient in helping determine the correct duration of a course of antibiotics for many common infections.
Many agree that a shorter course would bring three clear benefits: it would reduce the medical expenses; reduce chances or severity of side effects and other complications; and halt the development of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
Further Reading:- Effectiveness of discontinuing antibiotic treatment after three days versus eight days in mild to moderate-severe community acquired pneumonia: randomised, double blind study Abstract
|Full text|PDF - Three day versus five day treatment with amoxicillin for non-severe pneumonia in young children: a multicentre randomised controlled trial Abstract | Full Text | PDF
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