September blog post - all about antibiotics!

    We just finished the foundational antibiotics block, and while the material for this exam felt a little overwhelming and intense, I thought this block was also the most interesting thus far. Before the lectures in class, I never knew there were so many subclasses of antibiotics and they each had extremely specific usages and side effects. I was under the impression that that they all pretty much had the same effect on the body, but I was clearly wrong. The antibiotics are broken down into subclasses based on how they attack bacterial infections, and even further on which specific bacteria they are good for. As I was stressing over the upcoming exam and trying to study as much as possible, last week I noticed some bumps pop up on the back of my thighs. In an ironic turn of events, I had a bacterial skin infection while we were studying antibiotics in class. I'm not sure if this knowledge was helpful or if it made me spiral with concern of what bacteria it was - I even thought of MRSA at one point. In the doctors office I was informed it was a mild case of impetigo or strep, while he left the office I then found myself thinking about what he would prescribe me and if I would recognize it from the list of drugs we were covering in class. We have also covered drug interactions while learning about the different antibiotics, antivirals, and anti-fungals, which was important and interesting to learn. It had never occurred to me before that certain drugs could impact the efficacy of other drugs taken at the same time so extensively. Also some of the side effects produced by these drugs could also present as an unrelated condition and require other medications for management. This made me realize just how important it is for medical providers to go over possible side effects of medications so that patients are conscious of the possible negative impacts of medications that overall for their clinical benefit and that they don't misinterpret these adverse events as an unrelated condition. 

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