7 ms·

The healthcare needs to be completely overhauled. So many doctors are completely ignorant of risks of antibiotics and other meds. There was a study that found

The healthcare needs to be completely overhauled. So many doctors are completely ignorant of risks of antibiotics and other meds. There was a study that found 7% of doctors reported adverse reactions. Some were scared, some didn’t know how, some didn’t have time. Some doctors made no reports in nearly lifetime of practice. When I was 16-22 I had multiple 6+ months courses of doxycycline for acne. I have seen multiple dermatologist who said nothing can be done about my cystic acne. At some point I was tired of doxy making me feel awful so I researched different skin types and skin care routines. As long as I use a mild soap twice a day, use a moisturizer and don’t touch my skin I get 0 cystic acne but it took weeks to see the results. No doctor ever told me about different types of skin and I was young and dumb. My parents didn’t know any better. And internet wasn’t as popular back then. Then, I got an adverse reaction to cipro. And 40+ doctors ignored it. Told me it’s all in my head. Told me to seek help for my mental health and depression. Later FDA added warning about permanent nerve damage. I still have to send studies to doctors because they try to tell me I’m wrong, after I had every test under the sun to rule out other causes. I help admin flouroquinolone toxicity group and every day we get individuals who were given these last resort meds for suspected infection. It is border line medical malpractice. However, I have seen that it is impossible to find a lawyer to take the case and find a physician willing to testify. There needs to be a better system for tracking allergic reactions and trends. For example, cipro might show no reaction up to 6 months. Then, you snap your Achilles. The doctor won’t tell you it was cipro unless you tell him. It’s fucked and extremely underreported.

ipaddr 4y ago
Are there any techniques for recovery you discovered?
- Madmallard 4y ago
  If you were damaged enough for long term side-effects it is likely to an extent an irreversible process, as it trends to be for many diseases. That's not to say you can't have some recovery and adapt, just that what you were before is never coming back. I developed diastolic dysfunction and severe sensitivities and food intolerances after Cipro and other antibiotics in 2014. The only way there could be a persistent diastolic dysfunction is if there has been permanent damage to the cells of the heart. If he has input as to things which helped him I'd love to see, but as far as I understand, if the mechanism is indeed mtdna depletion and mutagenesis from excessive ROS then I don't really see how you actually cure that.
  - codeTired 4y ago
    Would you mind sharing how you were diagnosed? I know that aortic aneurysms is a common side effect. There is variety of supplements one can take. There is a physician in Germany Dr. Stefan Piper who published a book on it. He goes over possible therapies. Tendonitis usually gets manageable. Neurological symptoms are the ones that are more difficult to treat. Some people report success with high dose thiamine, but high dose thiamine has been helpful in fibro and small fiber neuropathy along with alpha lipoic acid. Anti depressants can be also used to manage symptoms. Some people reported resolution with pirenzepine. There is a drug company putting pirenzepine in a cream to treat nerve damage. That is currently in trials. I think the company is called WinSanTor. My condition has improved but I still cycle. I’m taking antioxidants and other supplements that support mitochondria. There is a sticky thread on reddit r/floxies, that discuss some of the supplements used and reasoning behind them.
    - Madmallard 4y ago
      I was never diagnosed with fluoroquinolone toxicity. Doctors don't really acknowledge it. The best you'd be able to do is a muscle biopsy, if you were able to convince. With my heart we have echocardiograms from before and after the antibiotics and it went from normal with good parameters to abnormal with questionable parameters. Things like E/A reversal, a large increase in deceleration time, and a significant decrease in mitral valve bloodflow velocities. These are tell-tale signs that your heart is starting to struggle that usually aren't seen until like middle aged diabetics or later on for non-diabetics. But I'm 32, and previously above average fitness. Likewise the food sensitivity reactions are mostly diagnosis by symptoms. I've had a mild elevation in tryptase during a reaction but everything else has largely been normal. I used to take supplements but they never really seemed to do much. When I took things I needed because of malnutrition there were improvements but that was about it. Subjectively I would say I felt more energetic while on B complex and L-Carnitine but I eventually developed a sensitivity to those medications, as I do with anything I continually intake, because my immune system's mechanism of tolerance has been disrupted by the antibiotics (and maybe something genetic who knows).
      - 4y ago
bejelentkezni 4y ago
>So many doctors are completely ignorant of risks of antibiotics and other meds. Not ignorant, complicit.
swayvil 4y ago
The problem is how knowledge in managed in our society. A central authority administering truth to the greater unwashed mass is the popular method. And it seems to be built into us, to get our truth that way. Truth is what the authority tells us. Contriving truth yourself is generally considered a perversion. So there's that inertia, keeping the knowledge management system stuck this way. Maybe high-quality society-wide pervasive knowledge is impossible.
tcbawo 4y ago
Doctors in the USA have no feedback mechanisms to know whether treatments work or not. They’re probably falling back to hunches in marginal cases. Also, if you are discussing treatment options with parents or patients, advising against antibiotics is a losing battle: the parent/patient gets angry whether you are right or wrong. The question of whether antibiotics would be helpful or ineffective means there is asymmetric risk. Even long term risks are unknown on an individual case by case basis.
- codeTired 4y ago
  There is definitely a mix of issues. Some patients expect antibiotics because they paid for the visit. However, every physician should be able to present patient with different options and risks. It simply is not happening. Some antibiotics carry smaller risks than flouroquinolones as this drug belongs to topoisomare II inhibitors along with chemo drugs. Some reactions we are seeing are much like damage from chemo. However, the action of damage is still very poorly understood. There is some research on mitochondrial dna damage and adducts. There recently has been talk if flouroquinolone antibiotics could be a potential cancer treatment even. If I knew I would never touch this antibiotic unless on my death bed.
  - freddie_mercury 4y ago
    I live in an Asian country where antibiotics are massively overused. Go to the local pharmacy and tell them you have cold symptoms and you're likely to get 3 different full spectrum antibiotics. I've asked a few pharmacists about this and the usually say they know it is bad but it is what people expect -- the more pills they get, the more effective they think the treatment will be. If you don't hand out as many pills as the pharmacy down the road then you'll lose customers and go out of business. So it is a race to the bottom tragedy of the commons kind of market failure that can only really be fixed with effective government regulation. Which isn't easy in a developing country, to say the least.
    - darkteflon 4y ago
      Is this Japan, perchance? Every time we take my kid to a doctor here they seem to reach for antibiotics. Extremely frustrating and the source of some cross-cultural marriage tension.
victorclf 4y ago
I research every prescribed treatment side effects after levofloxacin gave me bilateral achilles tendinitis. In my experience, potential side effects and complications from treatments are never discussed with patients. I also had the displeasure of suffering from the mental side effects of the antiallergic montelukast, which again were not even mentioned by the doctor despite the serious FDA warning.
ReptileMan 4y ago
>The healthcare needs to be completely overhauled. So many doctors are completely ignorant of risks of antibiotics and other meds. Doctors are well aware by my talks with them. There is unfortunately a large subset of the population that unless prescribed antibiotics feel that they have not been taken care by the doctor. So there is quite a demand.
cycomanic 4y ago
There are many things wrong with the Swedish system, but what they really managed well is to reduce the amount of prescribed antibiotics. My partner is a GP and doctors need to justify antibiotic prescriptions ver specifically. It means that Sweden is still using many "old" antibiotics which are not used in most other European countries anymore due to high resistance there.

ipaddr 4y ago

Are there any techniques for recovery you discovered?

Madmallard 4y ago
If you were damaged enough for long term side-effects it is likely to an extent an irreversible process, as it trends to be for many diseases. That's not to say you can't have some recovery and adapt, just that what you were before is never coming back. I developed diastolic dysfunction and severe sensitivities and food intolerances after Cipro and other antibiotics in 2014. The only way there could be a persistent diastolic dysfunction is if there has been permanent damage to the cells of the heart. If he has input as to things which helped him I'd love to see, but as far as I understand, if the mechanism is indeed mtdna depletion and mutagenesis from excessive ROS then I don't really see how you actually cure that.
- codeTired 4y ago
  Would you mind sharing how you were diagnosed? I know that aortic aneurysms is a common side effect. There is variety of supplements one can take. There is a physician in Germany Dr. Stefan Piper who published a book on it. He goes over possible therapies. Tendonitis usually gets manageable. Neurological symptoms are the ones that are more difficult to treat. Some people report success with high dose thiamine, but high dose thiamine has been helpful in fibro and small fiber neuropathy along with alpha lipoic acid. Anti depressants can be also used to manage symptoms. Some people reported resolution with pirenzepine. There is a drug company putting pirenzepine in a cream to treat nerve damage. That is currently in trials. I think the company is called WinSanTor. My condition has improved but I still cycle. I’m taking antioxidants and other supplements that support mitochondria. There is a sticky thread on reddit r/floxies, that discuss some of the supplements used and reasoning behind them.
  - Madmallard 4y ago
    I was never diagnosed with fluoroquinolone toxicity. Doctors don't really acknowledge it. The best you'd be able to do is a muscle biopsy, if you were able to convince. With my heart we have echocardiograms from before and after the antibiotics and it went from normal with good parameters to abnormal with questionable parameters. Things like E/A reversal, a large increase in deceleration time, and a significant decrease in mitral valve bloodflow velocities. These are tell-tale signs that your heart is starting to struggle that usually aren't seen until like middle aged diabetics or later on for non-diabetics. But I'm 32, and previously above average fitness. Likewise the food sensitivity reactions are mostly diagnosis by symptoms. I've had a mild elevation in tryptase during a reaction but everything else has largely been normal. I used to take supplements but they never really seemed to do much. When I took things I needed because of malnutrition there were improvements but that was about it. Subjectively I would say I felt more energetic while on B complex and L-Carnitine but I eventually developed a sensitivity to those medications, as I do with anything I continually intake, because my immune system's mechanism of tolerance has been disrupted by the antibiotics (and maybe something genetic who knows).
    - 4y ago

bejelentkezni 4y ago

>So many doctors are completely ignorant of risks of antibiotics and other meds. Not ignorant, complicit.

swayvil 4y ago

The problem is how knowledge in managed in our society. A central authority administering truth to the greater unwashed mass is the popular method. And it seems to be built into us, to get our truth that way. Truth is what the authority tells us. Contriving truth yourself is generally considered a perversion. So there's that inertia, keeping the knowledge management system stuck this way. Maybe high-quality society-wide pervasive knowledge is impossible.

tcbawo 4y ago

Doctors in the USA have no feedback mechanisms to know whether treatments work or not. They’re probably falling back to hunches in marginal cases. Also, if you are discussing treatment options with parents or patients, advising against antibiotics is a losing battle: the parent/patient gets angry whether you are right or wrong. The question of whether antibiotics would be helpful or ineffective means there is asymmetric risk. Even long term risks are unknown on an individual case by case basis.

codeTired 4y ago
There is definitely a mix of issues. Some patients expect antibiotics because they paid for the visit. However, every physician should be able to present patient with different options and risks. It simply is not happening. Some antibiotics carry smaller risks than flouroquinolones as this drug belongs to topoisomare II inhibitors along with chemo drugs. Some reactions we are seeing are much like damage from chemo. However, the action of damage is still very poorly understood. There is some research on mitochondrial dna damage and adducts. There recently has been talk if flouroquinolone antibiotics could be a potential cancer treatment even. If I knew I would never touch this antibiotic unless on my death bed.
- freddie_mercury 4y ago
  I live in an Asian country where antibiotics are massively overused. Go to the local pharmacy and tell them you have cold symptoms and you're likely to get 3 different full spectrum antibiotics. I've asked a few pharmacists about this and the usually say they know it is bad but it is what people expect -- the more pills they get, the more effective they think the treatment will be. If you don't hand out as many pills as the pharmacy down the road then you'll lose customers and go out of business. So it is a race to the bottom tragedy of the commons kind of market failure that can only really be fixed with effective government regulation. Which isn't easy in a developing country, to say the least.
  - darkteflon 4y ago
    Is this Japan, perchance? Every time we take my kid to a doctor here they seem to reach for antibiotics. Extremely frustrating and the source of some cross-cultural marriage tension.

victorclf 4y ago

I research every prescribed treatment side effects after levofloxacin gave me bilateral achilles tendinitis. In my experience, potential side effects and complications from treatments are never discussed with patients. I also had the displeasure of suffering from the mental side effects of the antiallergic montelukast, which again were not even mentioned by the doctor despite the serious FDA warning.

ReptileMan 4y ago

>The healthcare needs to be completely overhauled. So many doctors are completely ignorant of risks of antibiotics and other meds. Doctors are well aware by my talks with them. There is unfortunately a large subset of the population that unless prescribed antibiotics feel that they have not been taken care by the doctor. So there is quite a demand.

cycomanic 4y ago

There are many things wrong with the Swedish system, but what they really managed well is to reduce the amount of prescribed antibiotics. My partner is a GP and doctors need to justify antibiotic prescriptions ver specifically. It means that Sweden is still using many "old" antibiotics which are not used in most other European countries anymore due to high resistance there.