Antibiotics are chemical compounds that inhibit the growth of bacteria. Antimicrobials were once considered a panacea for virtually all diseases. The importance of these drugs in the fight against epidemics is quite large, but with careless use, antibiotics can harm the body.
A negative effect is manifested in the form of a weakening of the body's defenses, an imbalance of microflora in the intestines, impaired functioning of the kidneys, liver, gall bladder, and the appearance of an allergic reaction. To prevent the development of complications during treatment, doctors are advised to follow the rules for taking medications. What to do if you missed taking antibiotics? The answer to this question will be presented below.
In most cases, taking antibacterial drugs is carried out from one to four times a day. It is best to use antimicrobials at regular intervals at the same time daily. Using this scheme, the necessary level of antimicrobial concentration in the blood will be maintained.
Skip medication
What to do in this case? As a rule, the patient is not recommended to double the dosage if he missed 1 day of taking antibiotics. An antibacterial agent must be consumed as soon as a person remembers, or the next time according to a schedule.
As a rule, doctors recommend adhering to the scheme:
- If the daily dose of the medicine is divided into several parts and less than three hours have passed after the prescribed time of administration, then the person is allowed to drink the medicine. Further, the use of an antibiotic occurs according to the established scheme.
- If more than three hours have passed, then the next dose of the drug must be completed on a schedule without increasing the dosage.
If you drink a double concentration of the antibiotic, there is a risk of adverse reactions. Before taking a medication, you should always read the annotation to the drug, since it contains important information about this antibacterial agent.
Forgot to use pills
It is important to remember that if you skip one day of taking antibiotics, an exacerbation of the disease may occur.
If the drug was discontinued for several days, then it is necessary to consult with a medical professional about this. It is very important to consult a doctor if the drug is not used due to side effects or another disease.
What to do if you missed taking an antibiotic? Usually, doctors advise prolonging the course of treatment by the number of days that the medicine was not taken, since during this time the concentration of the active substance in the patient’s blood decreased. This option is possible only if a person does not have side effects.
There are times when doctors do not advise taking the same medication after a break. As a rule, this applies to diseases with a severe course, for example, purulent tonsillitis. The ban is argued by the fact that bacteria get used to the antibiotic and develop immunity to it. Accordingly, the medicine will be ineffective, and treatment will need to be started again.
What to do in order not to forget
Patients sometimes ask if antibiotics can be skipped. Doctors categorically do not recommend this for several reasons. Firstly, the concentration of the active substance in the blood decreases and the effectiveness of the treatment decreases. Secondly, the bacteria adapt to this type of antibiotic and stop responding to it.
When it is difficult for a person to remember the time of drug use, you should use the following recommendations:
- An antimicrobial drug should be taken at the same time as some kind of systematic action is performed, for example, brushing your teeth. In this case, it is necessary to consider when you need to take the drug - before or after a meal.
- Set an alarm for the next appointment according to the schedule.
- After each use of the medication, you can make a mark in the diary or a special calendar.
If it’s still difficult to remember when to take an antibacterial agent, you can purchase a special container for drugs. It has compartments for tablets with the names of the days of the week. So it will be easier to remember what time or day of the week you need to take the drug.
You always need to complete what you started.
Antibiotic therapy should be completed completely, without giving up a course of treatment in the middle of the path. Even if it got better. It is important to drink an antimicrobial agent before the completion of therapy (usually from five to seven days).
If you missed taking the antibiotic several times, then the unpleasant symptoms of the disease may return. Standard packages of antimicrobial agents are usually designed for short courses of therapy (3, 5, 7, 10 days).
To save money, when buying, you should choose the number of pills that matches the prescription of a medical professional. The drugs remaining from therapy cannot always be used in the future, since they simply will not be enough for the next full course.
Features
The most important conditions for the therapeutic effect of antimicrobials to be effective, and also to provide the necessary concentration of active substances in the patient's body, are:
- The use of the medication should be carried out as many times a day as prescribed by the doctor. In addition, all drugs have an annotation, where everything is clearly explained.
- For the greatest effect, the antibiotic should be used at regular intervals.
- The dosage recommended by the doctor should not be changed at the request of the patient. The concentration of the drug is calculated based on the individual characteristics of the body, as well as the age and weight of the person.
- It is not recommended to skip the time of taking an antimicrobial agent.
- The duration of therapy implies a certain duration of drug use. It is important to comply with it, and even improvement in well-being, normalization of body temperature and other factors should not be interpreted as a reason for drug withdrawal.
- In order for antibiotic treatment to be effective, and also not become a threat to health, you need to know about certain features of its use. To do this, it is important to carefully listen to the doctor's recommendations.
If you missed the time of taking the antibiotic for any reason, then you must continue to use it according to the recommendations of doctors.
What else should be considered when taking antimicrobials
A large number of antibiotics are incompatible with antacid drugs that are prescribed for lesions of the gastrointestinal tract. If there is a need to take several medicines at the same time, then you need to turn to this question with a specialist who will explain the correctness of therapy with one and the other pharmacological agent so that they do not counteract each other.
Tetracyclines, quinolones can increase the sensitivity of the skin to ultraviolet radiation. When using these medicines, exposure to sunlight should be avoided. Applying sunscreen is welcome.
Tetracyclines, quinolones can increase the sensitivity of the skin to ultraviolet radiation. When using these medicines, exposure to sunlight should be avoided as much as possible. The application of sunscreens is encouraged, and it is also important to refrain from visiting the solarium during therapy.
Absolutely all antimicrobials are not compatible with alcohol. During the course of antibiotic therapy, such drinks are completely eliminated from consumption.
It is important to remember: the use of antimicrobials, if their shelf life has expired, can lead to serious negative consequences. They have a toxic effect on the body, increasing the likelihood of adverse reactions by several times.
Conclusion
As noted earlier, if you missed taking antibiotics, you need to urgently contact your doctor and get recommendations. The importance of antimicrobials in modern medicine is very difficult to overestimate, it is with their help that almost any infection can be eliminated. However, these medicines have a serious drawback: eliminating the pathogenic microflora, antimicrobial agents harm the beneficial bacteria present in the body.