Yum

Or 11 pints of heineken

Can’t believe I had to scroll down so far to see this comment. Tis the only job for the sniffles.

Yup. But some mothers won’t leave the GPs without an antibiotic for their precious little kids who have nothing more than a common cold.

And then don’t finish the doses out, which is akin to child abuse and wonder why the antibiotic doesn’t work the next time and blame the medical staff for not curing the darlings faster.
If you’re gonna ask for an a/b the least you can do is finish the course out as directed.

Ok, so its the fault of the Doctors/GP’s not the pharmacists.

Should Doctors not be pushing this home in a big way?

The doctors are but as a previous commenter said, some insist on a prescription before leaving the surgery. I heard of 1 doctor who prescribed sugar pills instead, amazing what the placebo effect will do

You Know what.. I think its more to do with paying 50 – 60 euro to see a doctor just for him to look at you for 5 mins and then say go home take some paracetamol and rest. you’ll be fine. There is defiantly a need to feel you are getting something for your hard earned monies.

A bruised ego is no reason to take an antibiotic though

@Simon I work in the UK where treatment is free and people still try to insist on antibiotics. I spend a lot of time explaining why they aren’t necessary for viral illnesses, even print the local guidelines with references for them and they still go to other doctors to get their antibiotic fix. Some cave in, so.e don’t

I hate this idea that people are demanding them from powerless doctors. The doctors wouldn’t just accede to ‘demands’ if the patients walked in asking for morphine or valium. They can and should refuse to prescribe them. They are the ones with medical degrees, not the patients.

Ah ye the good old medical card!! But to be fair it does cost 50c per prescription now!:-) Everyone I know with a medical card has either a whole draw or cabinet dedicated to their accumulated prescriptions, they could flog the stuff and make a fortune, a lot of them probably do!

All mothers are it seems. My friend told me his granny offered his mam a few ‘leftover antibiotics’ in the medicine cabinet when she was sick. I nearly died laughing.

As has been pointed out above Marie, doctor constantly tell people not to take antibiotics unless they can do some good. But there are some parents who insist on getting a prescription from the doctor because they’ve paid fifty euro, even though the doctor can tell them over and over again that it will do nothing for the illness.

I saw the reverse once with a member of my family who came back from the doctor with nothing because her child had a severe cold and was giving out hugely because the doctor wouldn’t give her a prescription.

What are doctors supposed to do in these circumstances?

Good point. I believe that all doctors should be obliged to complete a record of the types and amount of antibiotics being prescribed and the illness that they are being prescribed for. This should be Inputted into a national database. This would allow the tracking of there use.
The advent of MRSA and other superbugs can be linked to the overuse of antibiotics.

The fact that some people do not understand that antibiotics are not a cure for all ailments does not mean that doctors ought to prescribe them. The problem with colds is that they last a week if you take cold remedies, and if you take nothing they last 7 days. If you have a cough, you may need something to help it go but other than that, time is the only thing that actually heals.

Or just eat properly and exercise,

I tell you, since I took up running going on three years ago I feel much better and hardly ever get sick, best thing i ever did

And exercise of course, great for building up the immune system

@abi am asthmatic too, recently tried to fight off a sinus infection without an antibiotic, now on an ab along with a steroid :-( never again!

I too have chronic asthma. When I get a cold, you know what I do? Take my preventer inhaler twice a day and my reliever 4 times a day. I drink lots of fluids and stay warm.

If it spreads to my chest (and I can tell after 22 years of chronic asthma) I head to my doc, who gives me the once over and then, only if he deems it appropriate, prescribes me antibiotics. THAT’S how it’s supposed to go. I can pretty much self-diagnose at this stage, but I wouldn’t dream of self medicating with antibiotics.

If every cold you get turns into a chest infection, perhaps it’s time to speak to an asthma nurse to help you manage your condition better.

Yeah, but you guys are hardly the norm. You’s have underlying medical problems. It’s not the same thing.

How can anyone self medicate, antibiotics are on prescription only? The whole thing is a money racket to be honest! Doctors bill, antibiotic when you need them, and I trust the doc to only prescribe when necessary. the preventative inhaler is nearly 100 quid a pop! I’m keeping someone in luxury :-)

Dearbhla, my beclazone preventer (steroid) is €38. Yes, it is expensive and yes, it sucks asthma is not recognised as a Long Term Illness (for me and you it clearly is). But that’s just how it is. Take the meds, you don’t get sick as often or for as long.
And I know people who got a tub of antibiotics over the counter in Spain (you can also get inhalers over the counter there FYI) and they dose their kids with them when they have an ear infection etc.

If people were taking their ‘controller’ inhaler everyday as prescribed, and perhaps steroid nasal sprays too for people with concurrent rhinitis (very common in asthmatics) there would be a lot less of these infections.
So many asthmatics just use the ventolin too much.

As confident in your opinion as you seem to be, it’s not true. It’s a scientifically proven fact that overuse of antibiotics leads to more resilient bacteria and the antibiotic in question becomes defunct. There are only so many antibiotics that we can develop. If they continue to be misused, either by doctors doling them out for minor (and often non-bacterial) illnesses, or worse still, people not finishing their course when they are prescribed them, we will have a big problem on our hands.

It’s got nothing to do with saving money.

In my years on this planet with all it’s germs and bacteria out to get me I’ve never had antibiotics, I guess I’m lucky to be alive. in all fairness allot of the people in the US need a pill to start the day so I’m not surprised you have gone over to their way of thinking. I’ll stick with my immune system until it needs help when I get old.