It's not always a good idea to finish your prescription, researchers say

Posted by jesuslewis on August 10th, 2017

Contrary to conventional wisdom, it may not always be best to finish your prescriptions, according to British researchers.

Doctors have traditionally told their patients to “complete the course,” meaning that even if their symptoms have gone away, they should keep taking antibiotics until they finish their prescription. The thinking was, that a patient should keep taking the medication to ensure that all of the bacteria have been destroyed so that remaining bugs won’t become drug-resistant. It’s been fairly standard medical practice for decades. But some experts are starting to question it.

A new analysis published in BMJ found that there’s a risk that prescription drugs could make other bacteria in the body resistant, which could then spread the resistance to more threatening bugs.

“It is very unlikely that all bacterial of a particular species are killed, even after a prolonged course of treatment, unless the host immune system finishes them off. However, it is also likely that other bacteria, ‘colonizers’ in the body which are normally harmless will get resistance and then be able, in the future, to pass on the resistant genes to other more harmful bacteria,” said Oxford University disease and epidemiology expert, Tim Peto, who co-authored the study.

For example, Peto said, “patients who are prescribed repeated doses of antibiotics for recurrent urinary tract infections are more at risk of developing resistant bacteria.”

Prolonged antibiotic use doesn’t just affect the target bacteria, it affects the whole body and all the other, usually harmless, bacteria in it. Once the target bacteria is gone or, at least, no longer a problem, the continued antibiotic use changes all the other bacteria in the body. Prolonged use of antibiotics selects for the strongest strains of all that bodily bacteria. The study found some of that bacteria can come out of it resistant to antibiotics.

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