Many different bacterial illnesses are treated with antibiotic medications. Unfortunately, some bacterial strains have developed a resistance to these antibiotics and cannot be eliminated. Recent years have seen an increase in this issue, particularly in hospital settings where patients may be exposed to a wide variety of germs and viruses. As the bacteria that cause many common infections have evolved resistance mechanisms that enable them to live even when the antibiotics are taken in large dosages and for extended periods of time, they are becoming more difficult to treat with antibiotics. As a result, some bacterial strains are no longer susceptible to these treatments' ability to destroy them. Moving on, after figuring out these primary challenges, what should healthcare professionals prioritize in the hope of resolving/overcome these challenges?
There are several differend possible ways to combat the problem of antimicrobial-resistance in bacteria.
1. One approach is the development of new antibiotica structures. The problem is that just adding new side-strains to your molecule doesn't solve the problem because there are only so much variations you can make to your molecule till it no longer reaches its action site and thus loosing its antimicrobial effect.
2. Antibiotic-stewardship: the more rational use of antibiotics. This can solve the overuse of antibiotics and save the most potent antibiotics from beeing used on minor infections preventing bacteria to be able to develop resistance angainst them. But there is still the problem that even with a very effectiv antibiotic-stewardship there will be cases when you have to combat an infection with a strain that is resistant to all antibiotics.
3. Halting the use of antibiotics for a couple of years. Antibiotic resistance is only an evolutionary advantage if the bacteria are subjected to antibiotics. In the absence of antibiotics having the gens and producing 12+ differend proteins/enzymes for antibiotic-resistance puts these resistant bectaria at a disatvantage. And it has been shown that the rate of resistance goes down after a prolonged time of antibiotic-absence. The problem is: this is not a feasible approach.
In essence: the problem of antimicrobial-resistance is a severe problem in hospitals and ICUs around the world. Approach 1 and 2 are the most feasible. Particulary an antibiotic-stewardship where you have pharmacists, microbiologists and intensivcare specialists working together you can achive a significant improvement in the treatment of infections. But you will allways have cases where you will not be able to reach the patinet with your therapie.
Dear Alyssa Sadorra
my idea is that the best approach remain the vaccination not only for human but also for animals, since in my opinion the large use of antibiotics on animals farms can be one of the main sources of antibiotic resistance spread.
Develope a vaccine for some bacteria that has very variable genoma could be difficult since the vaccine to guarantee a good coverage may require many antigens but i there are some emerging terchnologies as
- rma vaccination (which need to be further tested for antimicrobial vaccines since the bacterial antigens do not carry the PMTs that can be produces by antigen expression of human cells induced by rna vaccination, which may suggest to use mutated antigens that may show reduced protective efficacy)
- outer membrane vesiscles based vaccines (expecially for animal vaccines)
that may speed up the antimicrobial vaccine development.
Moreover i'm also fashinated by the possiblity to use Bacteriophages.
best regards
Manuele
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