How many days does antibiotic treatment usually last?

Antibiotics are a very common drug nowadays. Their main function is to fight inflammation and achieve an anti-inflammatory and disinfecting effect. At the same time, you should also pay attention to the fact that a small number of patients may have some adverse reactions during the taking of antibiotics. These are common side effects of antibiotics. You should consult a doctor regularly and report these adverse reactions to the doctor. Choose the appropriate treatment plan based on the actual results. In this way, you can adapt faster and use antibiotics correctly.

Generally, when using antibiotics, doctors will prescribe a course of treatment, but many people find that sometimes the symptoms are significantly alleviated or even disappear after two or three days. At this time, everyone may have a misunderstanding, thinking that the infection has been cured and that the antibiotics can be reduced or discontinued, which affects the treatment effect.

The types of antibiotics and courses of treatment may be different for treating different diseases, different symptoms of the same disease, and different bacterial infections. For example, when treating community-acquired pneumonia, for common bacterial infections, such as Streptococcus pneumoniae, the medication only needs to be used for 72 hours after the fever subsides; for infections caused by pathogens that can easily cause lung tissue necrosis, such as Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Klebsiella or anaerobic bacteria, the general antibiotic course is more than 2 weeks; for atypical pathogens, such as Mycoplasma pneumoniae and Chlamydia infections, the course of treatment is usually 10 to 14 days; for the treatment of Legionella infection, the course of treatment is usually 10 to 21 days. The dosage of these drugs is mainly to relieve symptoms in the first few days, and to completely eliminate the bacteria in the next few days to prevent recurrence.

When the symptoms are relieved, the bacterial infection is indeed alleviated, but the medication cannot be reduced or stopped at will at this time. Because blindly reducing antibiotics will not only fail to exert their bactericidal effect, but small doses of drugs will make bacteria resistant. Stopping the medication midway will also result in incomplete elimination of the bacteria, leading to bacterial reinfection and repeated attacks of the disease.

Before choosing antibiotics, you should determine under the guidance of a doctor whether it is a bacterial infection, as well as the type and severity of the infectious bacteria. If antibiotics are chosen arbitrarily without clear judgment, adverse reactions are more likely to occur, and even symptoms may be aggravated and infections may recur. Correctly stopping medication is an important part of the rational use of antibiotics. Since each person's situation is different, it is recommended to follow the doctor's advice according to the specific situation.