- Knowledgebase: Antibiotic Information and Questions
- Questions about types of antibiotics, when to use them, and side-effects of using them.
- 13. How do antibiotics work? - Top
- To answer this question, one must first address the question, "What is an infection?"
An infection can be defined as the growth of harmful organisms within your body. These organisms can be viruses, bacteria, fungi or yeast, or parasites.
Antibiotics kill or suppress growth of bacteria. Some antibiotics interfere with the cell wall of the bacteria, while others prevent the bacteria from reproducing, and others interfere with their metabolism.
Bacteria can resist an antibiotic in a number of ways. In the case of Penicillin or Amoxicillin, some bacteria have an enzyme called beta lactamase which breaks down the antibiotic. In response to that problem, a new antibiotic was created, Augmentin, that has an ingredient in it called Clavulonic Acid, which prevents the beta lactamase from working, thus preserving the antibiotics function!
By exposing your body to an antibiotic, you will kill off some of the bacteria that live in your body. Unfortunately, other bacteria may then move in that are not bothered by that antibiotic. These are resistent bacteria. For this reason, any time you take an unneeded antibiotic, you increase the chance that you will harbor resistent bacteria in your body and make your next infection harder to treat. - Updated: March 9, 2001
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