During the past decade there have been several studies in high profile medical journals documenting the ineffectiveness of antibiotics for treating acute sinusitis.
In the latest such study, in the current Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), lead researcher, Dr. Jane Garbutt at the Washington University School of Medicine, puts it bluntly: “There is not much to be gained from antibiotics.”
Dr. Garbutt and colleagues randomized 166 adults to a 10-day course of either amoxicillin, 1,500 mg/d (as 3 doses) or placebo. They found no difference between the two groups in terms of scores on the Sinonasal Outcome Test-16. In terms of overall symptom burden, the placebo group actually had better outcomes. After 10 days, 78% of antibiotic test group and 80% of the placebo group no longer had symptoms (Garbutt JM, et al. JAMA 2012; 307(7): 685-692).
These findings are important because amoxicillin is by far the most heavily prescribed antibiotic for sinus infections.
An earlier study published in JAMA in 2007, called for “a reconsideration of antibiotic use for acute sinusitis (sinus infection). The current view that antibiotics are effective can now be challenged, particularly for the routine cases which physicians treat,” Lead author Dr. Ian Williamson, of the University of Southampton, UK, randomized 240 adults with acute sinusitis to treatment with one of the four following protocols: antibiotic and nasal steroid (amoxicillin, 500 mg, thrice daily plus budesonide, 200 μg, in each nostril once daily); placebo antibiotic plus nasal steroid; antibiotic and placebo nasal steroid; or placebo antibiotic and placebo nasal steroid.
Dr. Williamson and colleagues found that neither the antibiotic nor the nasal steroid, alone or in combination, was effective in resolving sinusitis (Williamson IG, et al. JAMA. 2007;298(21):2487-2496)
Doing More Harm Than Good?
In my clinical experience as a family physician for the past 40 years, I’ve not only observed the diminishing effectiveness of antibiotics in treating sinus “infections,” but more importantly, I’ve seen exacerbation or worsening of the patient’s condition following multiple courses of broad-spectrum antibiotics.
Since 1993, I’ve been treating patients suffering with severe chronic sinus symptoms and describing their condition as a candida or yeast overgrowth. The Mayo Clinic, in a landmark study published in September 1999, began using the term allergic fungal sinusitis to describe a very similar condition. Lead researcher, Eugene Kern, MD, concluded that “we need to look at the cause of chronic sinusitis as more than simply an anatomic or bacteriologic problem, but as an immune dysfunction mediated by a fungus.”
Chronic sinusitis is currently the world’s most common respiratory condition with more than 40 million sinus sufferers in the US alone. Primary symptoms can include nasal and head congestion, post-nasal drip, headache, irritability, diminished energy, smell and overall quality of life. Although it’s not a life-threatening disease, most people with this diagnosis feel miserable most of the time. And worst of all, most have been told by their physicians that they’ll have to learn to live with it.
Conventional medical treatment, consisting of antibiotics, corticosteroids, and sinus surgery (as a last resort) has been largely ineffective in curing this condition. The vast majority of people with chronic sinusitis typically have from one to three or more acute “flare-ups” per year, which they and their physicians assume to be caused by bacterial infection.
Despite the conclusions of the important studies cited above, physicians continue to reflexively prescribe antibiotics to treat the problem. In the vast majority of cases these patients do NOT have a bacterial infection that would respond to an antibiotic. It’s nearly always caused by either a virus (typically a cold virus) or some other allergic or environmental trigger causing severe inflammation of the mucous membrane lining the nose and sinuses.
Overuse Drives Overgrowth
Rather than treating the underlying causes of sinusitis, antibiotics instead dramatically reduce the population of beneficial bacteria living in a homeostatic relationship with candida (yeast/fungus) in the respiratory and GI tract. This reduction, coupled with the fact that the good bacteria are the “natural predators” of the candida (primary food source for the probiotics), then creates a significant imbalance and a candida overgrowth. When candida is allowed to overgrow, it begins to release toxins that can have a devastating effect on the surrounding tissue, causing severe inflammation to the lining of the respiratory and GI tracts, as well as throughout the body, e.g. inflammation of joints and muscles, multiple food sensitivities and environmental allergies, extreme fatigue, weakening of the immune system.
Antibiotics can certainly be life-saving and miraculously therapeutic when used appropriately. But the evidence seems abundantly clear: physicians are over-prescribing them, and in so doing are often creating more serious health problems for their patients. Unfortunately that’s not the only source of our antibiotics. They can also be found in our food – beef, poultry, pork – and even in municipal water supplies. They are surely a powerful class of drugs, but must be used with more discretion for they can also have catastrophic side-effects.
According to a 2008 article in Clinical Infectious Diseases, more than 142,000 people are rushed to the emergency room each year from adverse reactions to antibiotics, and an estimated 70,000 of those cases may be a result of unnecessary antibiotic prescriptions (Shenab N, et al. Clin Infect Dis. 2008;47(6):735-43). Over 100,000 Americans die every year from prescription drugs, many of which are antibiotics. In fact, medical treatment is the third leading cause of death (250,000 deaths per year) in the US, behind heart disease and cancer.
There are over 13 million antibiotics prescribed each year in the US for sinusitis. Resistance often develops, so sinus patients are often prescribed refills for ever-stronger antibiotics. They may find themselves feeling worse the more treatment they get. Children are more likely to suffer side effects such as diarrhea and abdominal pain from antibiotics. In addition, recent studies have repeatedly shown that antibiotics are not effective for most middle ear infections, while also increasing the likelihood of additional ear infections.
Finding a Better Way
For nearly twenty years I have been successfully treating patients suffering with severe chronic sinusitis along with frequent episodes of acute sinusitis. Although a definitive diagnosis remains elusive (we still do not have a consistently reliable laboratory test to confirm the diagnosis of candida overgrowth), I have repeatedly witnessed dramatic improvement in over 90% of my patients after administering an aggressive anti-fungal Candida treatment program. My own published study (Ivker, RS, Silvers, WS, Anderson, RA. Altern Ther Health Med. 2009;15(1):36-43) reinforces these findings.
Our approach is a natural, antibiotic-free treatment protocol that has worked well for my patients and readers of my Sinus Survival book for nearly 25 years. By adhering to the Sinus Survival Program, individuals can significantly reduce the severity and duration of colds, and often prevent sinus infections. If they do develop an infection, the same protocol can shorten the duration and lessen the symptoms. And there are no harmful side-effects using this natural approach, which includes anti-infective and anti-inflammatory herbs, supplements, dietary recommendations, and nasal hygiene.
Free access to the Sinus Survival solution is available at www.sinussurvival.com. The current updated natural cold and sinus infection solution is now available for free on-line. Also included is my proven program for treating fungal and chronic sinusitis. For physicians and other health care practitioners, I have recently established the Respiratory Healer Network to provide far greater access to the Sinus Survival Program. This includes an on-line training program enabling any health care practitioner who treats sinus patients to offer this successful holistic treatment option in their practice.
Just as I have been providing hope to people who feel depressed and hopeless with the misery of chronic sinusitis, now many more Respiratory Healers will also be able to tell their patients, “You don’t have to live with this!”
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