Unfortunately, the stereotype of the disease of a person who does not drink has formed. If you give up a glass of vodka at a party, there will no doubt be someone asking, "Are you sick? "However, few people understand that alcohol is very harmful to the body, especially in the treatment of other diseases. In this article we will talk about the compatibility of alcohol and antibiotic therapy. Let's try to understand whether it is possible to drink during treatment.
Consequences of taking antibiotics with alcohol
Antibiotics are one of the most powerful, effective and efficient groups of drugs that completely change science and medicine. Centuries ago, the average life expectancy of a person was about forty years, and with the advent of antibiotics in large numbers, a person began to live longer. Today, antibiotics are very controversial, and many young mothers talk about the horrors and consequences of frequent and long-term use of this drug by children. Indeed, like any potent drug, antibiotics also require careful attention and special reception rules. One of them is abstinence from alcohol during treatment. Otherwise, it can lead to serious consequences.
- Decreased drug concentration.As you know, antibiotics do not start to act immediately, but only after a certain amount of medication has accumulated in the body. Alcohol significantly reduces the absorption of the drug into the stomach and intestinal walls. This means that alcohol simply eliminates the effects of antibiotic therapy by reducing the concentration of the drug in the body. Therefore, taking the drug is simply useless and sometimes dangerous, because the lack of therapeutic effect leads to the development of the disease, an increase in the number of bacteria. In addition, small doses of an antibiotic cause harmful microorganisms to become resistant to this antibiotic, which then becomes ineffective.
- Load on the liver.Another negative consequence of the combination of alcohol with antibiotics is an excessive load on the liver. This organ is involved in the processing of ethyl alcohol and the neutralization of intermediate metabolic products of drugs. That is, the liver works as actively as possible during the reception of antibiotics, the load on the body increases with the intake of alcohol, and sometimes the liver may refuse.
- Disulfiram-like reaction.Sometimes taking alcohol with antibiotics ends in a strong reaction in the form of nausea, vomiting, convulsions and feeling unwell. This occurs when certain groups of antibiotics are taken in combination with ethanol. Often this reaction is used to encode a person from alcohol. A special tablet containing a substance is inserted into the subcutaneous space, and in equal doses enters the body for a long time - several months. If alcohol enters the human body during this period, all of the above symptoms will appear. A person develops a constant hatred for alcohol.
In addition, alcohol greatly thickens the blood, causing dehydration. How the antibiotic will behave in such conditions is a mystery, because each organism is individual. Sometimes the consequences of such a combination can be dangerous and irreversible. Therefore, it is strictly forbidden to drink alcohol during antibiotic therapy. This also applies to low-alcohol drinks.
How to take antibiotics properly
For a drug to be useful, it must be taken according to certain rules. As mentioned, it is impossible to combine it with alcohol, it is necessary to wait until the drug is completely eliminated from the body. This can last from a few hours to a few days after the last dose of the drug. Here are some other rules to follow when treating antibiotics.
Antibiotics should be taken at regular intervals, which is very important. If the doctor prescribes a needle or pill twice a day, it should be taken seriously after 12 hours. If the dose is prescribed three times, then you should take an antibiotic every 8 hours - for example, 6. 00, 14. 00 and 22. 00.
If the bacteria are highly resistant to this group of drugs, antibiotics may be ineffective. Before starting treatment, you should ideally go through a bacteriological culture to determine the most sensitive drug for a particular organism in a particular situation.
Any antibiotic should only be taken as prescribed by a doctor - not even worth talking about. Some diseases, despite all the severity of symptoms, may not be susceptible to antibiotic therapy, such as viral diseases.
Be sure to let your doctor know about any allergic reactions to the medication before you start. Also, take medications that your doctor regularly takes - hormonal contraceptives, blood thinners, antihistamines, etc. The combination of some drugs with antibiotics can lead to unexpected results.
Antibiotics should not be taken for less than 5 days, usually the course is about 7-10 days. Even if you feel better on the third day you take the medicine, you should not cancel it, otherwise the bacteria that are not completely buried will start to multiply again and attack the body. Another consequence of the early withdrawal of an antibiotic is that this bacterial strain becomes resistant to the accepted antibiotic. Next time, with a similar disease, this drug will be weak.
Take antibiotics exactly as directed, especially when combined with food. As a rule, most drugs in this group should be taken with plenty of water after meals. Medications are not washed down with juice, coffee and milk, and their effectiveness may be lower.
Antibiotics should be combined with the intake of beneficial bacteria, as antibiotic therapy can completely kill the intestinal microflora, causing dysbiosis, diarrhea, or diarrhea. To prevent this, you need to take probiotics and prebiotics in parallel.
These are the basic rules for taking antibiotics, which must be strictly observed, regardless of the drug group. Sometimes a doctor may not talk about these simple rules because they should be known to everyone.
When can antibiotics be combined with alcohol?
There are some antibiotics, the combination of which with alcohol is strictly contraindicated. These include fluoroquinolones, nitroimidazoles, cephalosporins, aminoglycosides, erythromycin, and a drug for tuberculosis. Under no circumstances should they be combined with alcohol, otherwise a complex disulfiram-like reaction will develop. If you plan to drink alcohol, which can not be prevented in any way, you should try to drink alcohol so that it does not interfere with the drug in the body. For example, some antibiotics clear the blood in 2-3 hours. Through this interval you can drink a glass of beer, a man of average build will remove it from the egg in a few hours. That is, with a new dose of the drug, the body will be sober and clean again. There are many nuances in such a theory, it is necessary to take into account the rate of excretion of drugs and alcohol from the body, to know the time interval between taking the drug. Therefore, it is still better to give up alcohol during treatment for your own health.
The first mention of the dangers of alcohol in antibiotic treatment dates back to the 1940s. During World War II, doctors began to actively use penicillin, which was used for the first time in the treatment of the masses. Then the patients were European soldiers who loved to drink beer. And beer, as you know, had an obvious diuretic effect and removed the drug from the body. The doctors then decided to "scare" the soldiers and told them about the serious consequences of combining alcohol with treatment. People in white coats were intuitively right, and even then they protected their patients from problems. Take care of yourself, do not drink alcohol during treatment!