A recently released Dutch study involving nearly 6,000 adult subjects found that giving antibiotics to patients in intensive care units (ICUs) to prevent infections increases the chance these patients will survive. The article reports that after four weeks, patients who received oral antibiotic had an absolute reduction of mortality of 2.9% compared to those who did not receive this preventative treatment. Moreover, those who received both oral and intravenous antibiotics had an absolute reduction of mortality of 2.9% compared with the control group.

These results add a new twist to the debate over the use—or overuse—of antibiotics by medical professionals: Drug-resistant bacteria are a growing problem in health care centers worldwide. To reduce deaths from these ‘superbug’ infections, experts have urged doctors to use antibiotics judiciously instead of prescribing them willy-nilly.

So is prophylactic administration of antibiotics the best solution for preventing ICU patient deaths from hospital-acquired bacterial infections? While this may be a good short-term solution, I think that it merely puts a temporary bandage on underlying problems with hospital protocols. Better cleaning and testing for drug-resistant infections should be the first actions we take, rather than pumping patients with antibiotics as a precaution.

Photo by markhillary