It’s one of the most widely held beliefs in medicine—and it’s wrong. New research has found that you don’t have to complete a course of antibiotics.

Patients are always told they must finish their antibiotic prescription because they would otherwise increase their resistance to the drug. My father and mother – both pharmacists – used to preach e same thing to me and my sister but, as I got older and discovered my calling as a medical intuitive, on the rare occasion where I needed an antibiotic (e.g. chest infection or ear infection), I opted to take less of it, and I didn’t finish the dose.

I reasoned that everyone is different – not only in terms of their physical body structure but their energetic structure as well – and that everyone will thus respond differently to drugs.  Someone may have a severe reaction to a 500mg dose but would do well on a 250mg dose.Someone may need to complete 5 days, another person 3 days, another a week!  The key is to listen to our own bodies!

Now, new research is proving my inner guidance was right all along.

In fact the very reverse of the medical myth could be true – researchers from Brighton and Sussex Medical School now say that it’s taking antibiotics unnecessarily that increases resistance.  It also damages gut health.

Lead researcher Martin Llewelyn says the advice to complete a course of antibiotics is not supported by any evidence—and it’s encouraging the rise of superbugs t can’t be treated by the drugs.

Did you realise that the idea of taking the full course comes from a misplaced ‘fear’ of under-treatment, but when the researchers looked at a range of common infections they found that antibiotics were effective in around half the time that is routinely prescribed.

For instance, the ear infection, otitis media, can be successfully treated within five days, yet the standard treatment time is 10 days. Similarly, streptococcal pharyngitis (the throat infection) needs just three to six days of treatment, and not the whopping 10 days prescribed. Pneumonia needs just five days of antibiotics, again just half the time that’s prescribed!

The medical profession adopts a one-size-fits-all approach to antibiotic prescribing – but we’re not all the same.

Treatment time can vary enormously from patient to patient and since antibiotics are a finite resource, doctors need to learn to change their prescribing habits, the researchers say.

Source: BMJ, 2017; 358: j3418