Antimicrobial sensitivity

ANTIMICROBIAL RESISTANCE AND JUDICIOUS USE OF ANTIBIOTICS
Antibiotics
Antibiotics are chemical substances, many of them derived from microorganisms that suppress the growth of other organisms and sometimes kill them. In clinical practice, the antibiotics are used to treat bacteriologically proven infections and also in the prophylaxis of certain diseases. They are sometimes used in the blind or empiric therapy of presumed infection. A different principle governs the selection of antibiotics for each of the above situations. An antibiotic appropriate for one situation may be absolutely out of context in another situation. The problem is magnified by the availability of increasing numbers of antibiotics and the emergence of resistant strains. The antimicrobial sensitivity varies from country to country, from town to town, hospital to hospital and even in the same hospital, from ward to ward! Thus the choice of an antibiotic need sound clinical judgment, a detailed pharmacologica...