Or should you stop it once you feel better? Doctors have confusing conflicting answer. Read on.
It seems that the old rule to complete the course of your antibiotic medication is wrong and should be overturned!
image from pixabay
Doctors always tell us that we should complete the entire course of our antibiotics when we are sick to prevent bacteria from mutating and become resistant to the drug. But experts recently published their analysis on the issue and concludes that the previous claim is not supported by evidence.
According to the experts, there has been too little research into the ideal length of a course of antibiotics which varies from one individual to the next and what antibiotics they have taken in the past.
Martin Llewelyn of Brighton and Sussex Medical School and his colleagues say “the idea that stopping antibiotic treatment early encourages antibiotic resistance is not supported by evidence, while taking antibiotics for longer than necessary increases the risk of resistance”.
“Outside hospital, where repeated testing may not be feasible, patients might be best advised to stop treatment when they feel better.”
But another group of experts expressed their concerns.
"Recommended courses of antibiotics are not random. They are tailored to individual conditions and in many cases, courses are quite short – for urinary tract infections, for example, three days is often enough to cure the infection."
“We are concerned about the concept of patients stopping taking their medication midway through a course once they ‘feel better’, because improvement in symptoms does not necessarily mean the infection has been completely eradicated. It’s important that patients have clear messages and the mantra to always take the full course of antibiotics is well known. Changing this will simply confuse people.” - Helen Stokes-Lampard, Chair - Royal College of GPs.
Confused? I know. What do we do now?
Which advise are we going to take?
Thankfully, UK’s chief medical officer Prof Dame Sally Davies has a better answer:
“The message to the public remains the same: people should always follow the advice of healthcare professionals. To update policies, we need further research to inform them.
Personally, I always complete my antibiotics and I would usually ask for the stronger drugs to make the course shorter.