Antibiotic Use In Many Hospitals Is Becoming Dangerous

Previous studies have warned of the dangers about overprescribing antibiotics. Not only can this result in antibiotic resistance, but it can also promote the spread of other serious infections in communities of otherwise healthy people.

Recent data suggests that many U.S. hospitals are unnecessarily prescribing multiple antibiotics for several days when just one could do the job, according to recent findings published in the journal Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology.

According to Dr. Barry Fox of the University of Wisconsin who is an expert on antibiotics, doctors will typically throw a couple of antibiotics at an extremely sick and feverish patient, "when we're not exactly sure what we're dealing with," to hopefully better combat the health issue, according to Health Day. 

However, once more tests are run and the health issue is identified, doctors are required to take most of the antibiotics out of the equations. According to Fox, this unfortunately isn't always the case.

Research shows that in three-quarters of up to 500 hospitals studied, patients were still on more than one intravenous antibiotic after two days. Researchers looked at hospital records for 2008 through 2011; results showed that not only could this be dangerous to the patient--resulting in resistance to the drug and nasty side-effects such as diarrhea with prolonged use--but the medical costs could also be astronomical and unnecessary, all-together.

With future studies, researchers and other health officials hope to bring more medical awareness to the issue and hope for the future surrounding the topic and the medical industry.