Antibiotic-induced vitamin deficiency

Shirakawa H, Komai M, Kimura S. Antibiotic-induced vitamin K deficiency and the role of the presence of intestinal flora. Int J Vitam Nutr Res 1990 60(3) 245-51. 

Parenteral Anticoagulant-induced prothrombin deficiency hypoprothrombinemia secondary to conditions limiting absorption or synthesis of vitamin K (eg, obstructive jaundice, biliary fistula, sprue, ulcerative colitis, celiac disease, intestinal resection, cystic fibrosis of the pancreas, regional enteritis) drug-induced hypoprothrombinemias due to interference with vitamin K metabolism (eg, antibiotics, salicylates) prophylaxis and therapy of hemorrhagic disease of the newborn. 

In every study, light was required for the effects of the inhibitors to become apparent. Chloroplasts of herbicide-treated plants kept in the dark resembled, in all respects, chloroplasts of the dark-control plants. The modifications produced in chloroplasts are not unique to herbicides. Mineral and vitamin deficiencies, antibiotics, unnatural pyrimidines, and genetic alterations all cause similar aberrant ultrastruetural changes in chloroplasts however, the extent of the disruptions produced by herbicides is more extreme. The changes induced by herbicides are similar in many respects to those that occur in normal senescence, reflecting the characteristic pattern associated with degeneration and death of a cell. 

In the case of Vitamin K-deficency owing to bile obstruction, which has lowered the value for prothrombin complex, vitamin K1 is administered intravenously. In moderate vitamin K-deficiency induced by therapy with antibiotics or diarrhoeas of long duration, oral vitamin K therapy is needed. Prophylactically vitamin K is used for treatment of haemorrhage in the newborn and therapeutically in cases of overdosage of warfarin-type anticoagulants. 

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