Blog article

It is well known that antibiotic resistance is on the increase. In Australia 19 million prescriptions are written each year. And we have one of the highest rates of antibiotic use in the world! The worst example was reported in The Medical Journal of Australia in 2014 where doctors were prescibing antbiotics to new cases of acute bronchitis 90% of the time. 

So what are the negatives of antibiotic use?

• Antibiotics do kill off good bacteria in the gut.
• Recent studies have demonstrated that a single course of antibiotics can affect microbes in the gut for up to a year.
• Antibiotic use in babies up to a year old may increase the risk of subsequent eczema.
• They may also increase the risk of developing auto immune disease.

If antibiotics are needed and sometimes they are necessary it is worth considering taking a probiotic to mitigate the impact on the microflora in the gut, improve the effects of antibiotics and enhance mucosal immunity. 

So what can we use?

During antibiotic treatment - Use of Saccaromyces boulardii a yeast which prevents diarrhoea , thrush and Clostridium spp. associated with antibiotic usage.

After antibiotic treatment - Use a high potency broad spectrum probiotic with a minimum of 500 million to 1 billion organisms in it for 28 days. 

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