Are antibiotics bad?

Pediatrician & Author Cara Natterson, MD, shares advice for parents on how are not bad for children, but that they can have differing results and the factors that determine their effectiveness
Can Antibiotics Be Bad For Children
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Are antibiotics bad?

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Antibiotics are not bad; it's just that they're not always helpful. I find that there are two extreme groups when it comes to antibiotics. There are people who won't take them no matter what, and there are people who want them for everything. And it doesn't work well for either group. You see, antibiotics are medicines that treat very specific bacteria. And so if you have an infection with a bacteria, and your body's not doing a good enough job of getting rid of the infection on its own, then you take the antibiotic and it helps the immune system. But if you have, say, a virus causing the problem, you can take all the antibiotics in the world and it's not going to help you. The problem comes in when people think antibiotics work for everything; they don't. Or when they refuse to take an antibiotic and they're actually very sick with a bacteria. And that can create serious problems. So I don't worry about antibiotics when a doctor is telling you why you need them and is prescribing them for very specific situations.

Pediatrician & Author Cara Natterson, MD, shares advice for parents on how are not bad for children, but that they can have differing results and the factors that determine their effectiveness

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Cara Natterson, MD

Pediatrician & Author

Cara Natterson, MD has treated thousands of children and guided their parents as well. She was a partner at Tenth Street Pediatrics in Santa Monica, California, a large group practice serving infants, children and teenagers. She now runs Worry Proof Consulting, the first of its kind pediatric practice that offers parents open-ended time to review everything from medical questions and biology basics to child development and parenting issues. Cara is also the author of several books on parenting and child health. She has a unique ability to translate cutting edge research into understandable terms for parents and their kids. More recently, Cara’s consulting has extended beyond individual families to include fortune 500 companies seeking expert advice on safety issues, child health, and crisis management.

Cara has appeared on television, in print, and on the web. She is a graduate of Harvard College and Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and she trained in pediatrics at the University of California at San Francisco. Cara is a Board certified pediatrician and a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics. And anyone who knows her knows that Cara is, by nature, one of the most risk-averse people on earth. She lives in California with her husband and two children.

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