Treatment of bacterial diseases

The polymyxins are a group of antibiotics produced by Bacillus polymyxa. Polymyxin B (Aerosporin) and co-Ustin (polymyxin E, Coly-Mycin) are used in the treatment of bacterial diseases. 

Unlike with humans and companions animals, for which the treatment of bacterial diseases is invariably directed at individual patients, antimicrobial therapy in food-producing animals can be applied on either an individual or herd/flock basis. 

Sarafloxacin is another fluoroquinolone administered with the drinking water to poultry for treatment of bacterial diseases, or incorporated in fish feed at... 

There are hundreds of topical steroid preparations that are available for the treatment of skin diseases. In addition to their aforementioned antiinflammatory effects, topical steroids also exert their effects by vasoconstriction of the capillaries in the superficial dermis and by reduction of cellular mitosis and cell proliferation especially in the basal cell layer of the skin. In addition to the aforementioned systemic side effects, topical steroids can have adverse local effects. Chronic treatment with topical corticosteroids may increase the risk of bacterial and fungal infections. A combination steroid and antibacterial agent can be used to combat this problem. Additional local side effects that can be caused by extended use of topical steroids are epidermal atrophy, acne, glaucoma and cataracts (thus the weakest concentrations should be used in and around the eyes), pigmentation problems, hypertrichosis, allergic contact dermatitis, perioral dermatitis, and granuloma gluteale infantum (251). 

Frequendy, the treatment of helminthic diseases requites adjunct medication. Allergic reactions are commonly seen as a result of tissue invasion by worms or as a consequence of anthelmintic therapy. Antihistamines and corticosteroids may be necessary adjuncts to therapy. Anemia, indigestion, and secondary bacterial infections can also occur and may requite concomitant therapy with hematopoietic drugs and appropriate antibiotics. 

More then a dozen representatives of the above ring systems were introduced into the human therapy. Actisomide (2) and trequinsin (3) are used as antiarrhytmic and antihypertensive agents, respectively. Sunepitron (4), a a 2-adrenoceptor antagonist, is under clinical trials for the treatment of anxiety and depression. Representatives of the third generation of antibacterial quinolone-3-carboxylic acids the blockbluster ofloxacin (5), its levorotatory enantiomer, levofloxacin (6), and rufloxacin (7) have gained wide acceptance for the treatment of bacterial infections of the respiratory and urinary tracts, skin, and soft tissues, as well as sexually transmitted diseases, and pazufloxacin (8) is under development. Praziquantel (9) is widely applied for the treatment of schistosomes- and cestode-caused infection in both veterinary and human therapies (Scheme 4). 

Chemotherapy is the control and treatment of disease by synthetic drugs. Most of these are organic compounds, often of remarkably simple structure. Sulfanilamide is one example of an organic compound synthesized by chemists for the treatment of bacterial infections. 

The discovery and production of antibiotics has been of tremendous importance to human and animal health care. Prior to their discovery about half a century ago, many bacterial infections caused debilitating diseases and fatalities were high. The discovery of antibiotics was a major step in the treatment of infectious diseases, especially those caused by bacteria. Today about 50,000 tonnes of antibiotics are produced annually. About a third of this consists of penicillins, whilst tetracyclines make up about a quarter of the market. 

As proposed in earlier publications, an ideal antimicrobial agent for the treatment of bacterial causes of infectious diarrhea would have the following features [1, 2] (1) excellent activity against a broad range of bacterial enteropathogens (2) nonabsorbable (3) favorable side effect profile (4) efficacious in the treatment of infectious diarrhea (5) major indication is enteric disease, and (6) does not easily develop resistance or promote cross-resistance. 

Appropriate empiric choices for the treatment of bacterial pneumonias relative to a patient s underlying disease are shown in Table 43-6 for adults and Table 43-7 for children. Dosages for antibiotics to treat pneumonia are provided in Table 43-8. 

Let s conclude this discussion of life with a short consideration of viruses. Viruses cause all sorts of problems for living organisms. The problems are the consequence of their ability to infect, and ultimately kiU, many types of cells— bacterial, animal, and plant—though each virus is quite specific in terms of the type of cell that it infects. There are many types of viruses. In people, they cause measles, mumps, influenza, AIDS, polio, potentially fatal diarrhea in infants and very young children, herpes, chicken pox, shingles, the common cold, and many other diseases, that may be fatal, serious, and not so serious. In other animals, viruses also cause any number of diseases, as they do in plants. Much effort has been, and continues to be, devoted to the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of viral diseases. 

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