What is sensitivity to antibiotics?
Antibiotic sensitivity is the level of sensitivity that bacteria has a particular type of antibiotic. Antibiotics work in a number of different ways on bacterial cells and many bacteria are more susceptible to certain antibiotics than others. By using tests in the laboratory to determine the sensitivity to antibiotics, the physician can find the most suitable antibiotic for the patient's treatment and reduce the development of antibiotics resistance to bacteria with only one type of antibiotic, rather than several different drugs. The agar board is prepared from small tablets of different antibiotics or strips impregnated by various concentrations of antibiotics and cultivated bacteria are introduced on the plate. If bacteria are sensitive, small rings appear around antibiotic samples, indicating that bacteria cannot grow there. Bacteria will have difficulty growing around several samples, allowing doctors a number of treatment options.
When the patient is immediately treated, often receives the course of antibiotics before performing an antibiotic test, as it may be important to start fighting bacteria. The test will determine whether these drugs are appropriate and the patient treatment may be changed in response to the test results. In routine or common infections, doctors may decide to skip the sensitivity testing phase, provided standard treatment is effective.
It can be expensive to perform antibiotic sensitivity tests and obtain antibiotics that are revealed as suitable for using testing. For this reason, testing is usually used only if it is clearly needed. Laboratory testing is generally more convenient than testing with antibiotics in the patient, for many reasons, including concerns about finding the most effective treatment, avoiding the development of antibiotics resistance and maintaining costs available to the patient or medical clinic.
Some bacteria are infamous for the development of antibiotic resistance or it is very difficult to treat. In cases where they are pAcienti infected with these bacteria, the doctor often recommends testing sensitivity to antibiotics to ensure that appropriate treatment is provided. Testing can also be used to learn more about a specific infection and to collect data on discovery focus, which can detect ways to spread bacteria.