Antibiotics for exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

CONCLUSIONS: Researchers have found that antibiotics have some effect on inpatients and outpatients, but these effects are small, and they are inconsistent for some outcomes (treatment failure) and absent for other outcomes (mortality, length of hospital stay). Analyses show a strong beneficial effect of antibiotics among ICU patients. Few data are available on the effects of antibiotics on health-related quality of life or on other patient-reported symptoms, and data show no statistically significant increase in the risk of adverse events with antibiotics compared to placebo. These inconsistent effects call for research into clinical signs and biomarkers that can help identify patients who would benefit from antibiotics, while sparing antibiotics for patients who are unlikely to experience benefit and for whom downsides of antibiotics (side effects, costs, and multi-resistance) should be avoided. PMID: 30371937 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Source: Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews - Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: Cochrane Database Syst Rev Source Type: research