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new research this morning claims millions of children get antibiotics they don't need the American Academy of
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Pediatrics says they're being prescribed twice as often as they should be for children with respiratory infections the
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study estimates 11.4 million antibiotic prescriptions each year are unnecessary our Dr Holly Phillips is with us this
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morning good morning good morning Nora so tell us what this study found out you know this study really looked at data on
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thousands of kids that had common respiratory infections that can be caused either by viruses or bacteria
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these are things like sore throats um ear infections sinusitis even some bronchitis symptoms and they found that
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about 27% of the time these infections are caused by bacteria in which case antibiotics will help but in 57% of
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cases where kids were brought to the doctor with these symptoms they were prescribed an antibiotic so basically
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that's more than twice as many antibiotics that should be prescribed was never a good thing it seems like
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we're always hearing stories about kids being overprescribed but what makes this
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one different well you know this really gives us numbers absolutely we know antibiotics is overprescribed this gives
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us really a sense of how significant the you know the the problem is why is it happening you know the bottom line is
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it's actually very difficult to tell whether or not an infection is caused by a bacteria or a virus it's an imperfect
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science so in the office we have a few tests we can use for instance for sore throats we have a strep culture or a
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swab that can give a sort of a scientific answer but most of the time doctors we have to take an educated
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guess we look at how severe the symptoms are how long they've lasted um and we do
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some physical exam in the office and we basically have to guess this study is suggesting that sometimes at least half
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the time we guess wrong right and a reminder about how harmful antibiotics can be in the long term this
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overprescription of them absolutely you know that's really the main reason we're
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seeing the emergence of super bugs these are uh bacteria that are resistant to all antibiotics kids can also have just
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common adverse reactions it's nausea stomach upset severe allergic reactions antibiotics really are not completely
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benign drugs thank you Dr Holly Phillips sure thank you