Rybee
Bluelighter
- Joined
- May 29, 2013
- Messages
- 1,305
Hi All, first of all I've had a fairly severe chest infection that's kept me up all night so have taken some Quetipaine, Morphine, Clonazolam, and Pregabalin to induce a strong sleep - I'm feeling quite faded and as such, my post may be a tad incoherent - really sorry for that, I do hope it's okay.
Background to Story
I had quite a severe chest infection come on w/c Monday 28th September and was p/x'd 500mg Amoxicillin TDS. I'm a bit of an antibiotic-phobe due the whole resilience epidemic and what not so decided to go without taking any to see if it just passed naturally. Reluctantly, I had to take the week off of work expecting to be fine to return by the end of last week (1st/2nd Oct). The Saturday just gone (4th) I was wheezing more than Lil Wayne and gasping for breath after walking up the stairs and generally losing my breath during normal conversation. This was also accompanied by a high fever which has got really quite bad over the last 48 hours and I'm now feeling horribly shit and have just been signed off of work for another week. Much to the annoyance of myself as I only have 8 weeks of my job left and don't want to be seen as a winding down sick-note/slacker, but also my local team of four (in HR covering ~1500 staff is quite a task). One colleague is on holiday and my doctor has signed me off work until w/c 12th Oct so they're only down to 2/4 people in office to battle away against all of our workloads.
So the jist of this story is that I need to get my chest infection cleared up ASAP (and have it NOT return) so that I can return to work and muck in and help reduce the workload that the two girls are picking up for the four of us, hopefully on Thursday/Friday. This morning my doctor prescribed me the same 5 day course of Amoxicillin (500mg TDS) that he prescribed to me last Monday.
I've read so many conflicting articles on antibiotics, and if I'm honest, they're one class of drug that scares me a little bit due to resilience - I think we're heading for a world-wide antibiotic resilience crisis quite soon. I've just cashed in my second prescription so have 30x500mg Amoxicillin's on hand for a 5 day course, and from a Pharmacological POV I need to know how much to take in order to really hit this bacterial infection this on the head ASAP not allow it to come back so that I can get back into action, hopefully attending work on Thursday and Friday to help out my team.
Now 'the obvious 8)' thing to do to help me get the best chance of a speedy recovery - and I say it like that, as I have no idea about antibiotics... is either one of four things IMO?
1) Just take 500mg TDS course for 5 days as generically directed and *hope* that is sufficient to really beat the fuck outta this infection with no chance of it returning - anyway, I guess the guidelines were drawn up my Doctors and Pharmacists alike, so as to be as effective as possible?
2) Just take 500mg TDS course for 5 days as generically directed, but then carry on by taking the second packet at another 500mg TDS course for a further 5 days to really ensure I've nailed the infection on the head and that it wont come back. I can't keep going back to work then pulling out then going back again like I was last week... it's really disruptive to my team.
3) Instead of following the generic 500mg TDS guidelines, double my dose to 1,00mg TDS. The thought being, that this would really 'hit the infection hard'. So take 1,000mg in the morning 1,000mg in the afternoon and 1,000mg in the evening for 5 days to finish the course, instead of 500mg in the morning, 500 in the afternoon and 500mg in the evening, just as I usually would anyway in the hope that the extra potent double-whammy dose of antibiotics for a short period of time would absolutely annihilate the infection, clear it up very quickly allow me to return to work on Thursday/Friday instead of next Monday/Tuesday. I know the team could really do with my support.
4) As Amoxicillin seems to have a half life of only ~60 minutes, I could stick to my 5 day course but instead of taking 500mg TDS I could take 500mg Q4H (six times daily, so, every 4 hours). This would allow me to squeeze in double the dose of antibiotics during my five day course but possibly reap some more rewards by spreading out the 6x500mg dose throughout the day and night every 4 hours and thus provide my blood stream with a highly concentrated and steady dose throughout the day and night.
As said, I really do apologise if these sound like stupid suggestions/questions but I did see a junior who kept having to refer to his handbook which didn't feel me with confidence - so I just had to trust his advise. Admittedly the pharmacological mechanisms of antibiotics are a whole now world to me, I don't know much about their use (apart from Gamma Positive and Gamma Negative antibiotics which I've just been reading about!)
So yeah please take it easy with me, and anything constructive to enable a quick but thorough recovery would be really, really appreciated.
I just want to get back to work and help my colleagues
Thanks Rybee xx
Background to Story
I had quite a severe chest infection come on w/c Monday 28th September and was p/x'd 500mg Amoxicillin TDS. I'm a bit of an antibiotic-phobe due the whole resilience epidemic and what not so decided to go without taking any to see if it just passed naturally. Reluctantly, I had to take the week off of work expecting to be fine to return by the end of last week (1st/2nd Oct). The Saturday just gone (4th) I was wheezing more than Lil Wayne and gasping for breath after walking up the stairs and generally losing my breath during normal conversation. This was also accompanied by a high fever which has got really quite bad over the last 48 hours and I'm now feeling horribly shit and have just been signed off of work for another week. Much to the annoyance of myself as I only have 8 weeks of my job left and don't want to be seen as a winding down sick-note/slacker, but also my local team of four (in HR covering ~1500 staff is quite a task). One colleague is on holiday and my doctor has signed me off work until w/c 12th Oct so they're only down to 2/4 people in office to battle away against all of our workloads.
So the jist of this story is that I need to get my chest infection cleared up ASAP (and have it NOT return) so that I can return to work and muck in and help reduce the workload that the two girls are picking up for the four of us, hopefully on Thursday/Friday. This morning my doctor prescribed me the same 5 day course of Amoxicillin (500mg TDS) that he prescribed to me last Monday.
I've read so many conflicting articles on antibiotics, and if I'm honest, they're one class of drug that scares me a little bit due to resilience - I think we're heading for a world-wide antibiotic resilience crisis quite soon. I've just cashed in my second prescription so have 30x500mg Amoxicillin's on hand for a 5 day course, and from a Pharmacological POV I need to know how much to take in order to really hit this bacterial infection this on the head ASAP not allow it to come back so that I can get back into action, hopefully attending work on Thursday and Friday to help out my team.
Now 'the obvious 8)' thing to do to help me get the best chance of a speedy recovery - and I say it like that, as I have no idea about antibiotics... is either one of four things IMO?
1) Just take 500mg TDS course for 5 days as generically directed and *hope* that is sufficient to really beat the fuck outta this infection with no chance of it returning - anyway, I guess the guidelines were drawn up my Doctors and Pharmacists alike, so as to be as effective as possible?
2) Just take 500mg TDS course for 5 days as generically directed, but then carry on by taking the second packet at another 500mg TDS course for a further 5 days to really ensure I've nailed the infection on the head and that it wont come back. I can't keep going back to work then pulling out then going back again like I was last week... it's really disruptive to my team.
3) Instead of following the generic 500mg TDS guidelines, double my dose to 1,00mg TDS. The thought being, that this would really 'hit the infection hard'. So take 1,000mg in the morning 1,000mg in the afternoon and 1,000mg in the evening for 5 days to finish the course, instead of 500mg in the morning, 500 in the afternoon and 500mg in the evening, just as I usually would anyway in the hope that the extra potent double-whammy dose of antibiotics for a short period of time would absolutely annihilate the infection, clear it up very quickly allow me to return to work on Thursday/Friday instead of next Monday/Tuesday. I know the team could really do with my support.
4) As Amoxicillin seems to have a half life of only ~60 minutes, I could stick to my 5 day course but instead of taking 500mg TDS I could take 500mg Q4H (six times daily, so, every 4 hours). This would allow me to squeeze in double the dose of antibiotics during my five day course but possibly reap some more rewards by spreading out the 6x500mg dose throughout the day and night every 4 hours and thus provide my blood stream with a highly concentrated and steady dose throughout the day and night.
As said, I really do apologise if these sound like stupid suggestions/questions but I did see a junior who kept having to refer to his handbook which didn't feel me with confidence - so I just had to trust his advise. Admittedly the pharmacological mechanisms of antibiotics are a whole now world to me, I don't know much about their use (apart from Gamma Positive and Gamma Negative antibiotics which I've just been reading about!)
So yeah please take it easy with me, and anything constructive to enable a quick but thorough recovery would be really, really appreciated.
I just want to get back to work and help my colleagues
Thanks Rybee xx