Developments in Antibiotic Treatment of Respiratory Infections in General Practice towards Better Prescribing

Abstract

A general practitioner in the United Kingdom may well see, especially in the busy winter months, up to three hundred patients per week, of these three quarters could easily be suffering from respiratory disease. These will largely consist of the elderly or children. Much of this respiratory disease will be seen in a very early phase, and may well be self limiting and self-curing. In addition many of the conditions will have a viral rather than a bacterial aetiology. This then presents the major difficulty for the general practitioner, whom do you select for treatment with antibiotics, taking into account the size of the problem and the early nature of the disease as it is encountered in family practice.