At the Sound to Bay 5/10K in Jamesport last week, a few other docs and I hosted a health fair table on behalf of Peconic Bay Medical Center. We had tons of free information, handouts, educational models including a pound of fat and clogged coronary arteries to demonstrate what excess weight, high blood pressure and high cholesterol can do to your body. We offered free blood pressure screenings and health advice. But what everyone was drawn to were our freebies: small containers of hand sanitizer with a carabiner attached for easy access.
Because of the nature of my work, I’m a germophobe. In medicine, we see the worst of the worst infections. Flesh-eating bacteria, gangrene, loss of digits and limbs and of course sepsis, infections that become blood-borne. As soon as I walk in the door from work, I leave my shoes at the door and throw my scrubs in the laundry. But my fear of bringing home some superbug probably doesn’t apply to the general population, those who are not exposed to hospital grade pathogens. In fact, I often wonder if the prevalence of autoimmune diseases has arisen because of our obsession with cleanliness.
You can admit it. You’re probably been guilty at some point of disinfecting your self or your children after a session at the local jungle gym or library. You may be the one at work who incessantly sanitizes, won’t use the phone or keyboard without dousing it in Purell first. Don’t get me wrong – science has proven time and again that the best way to prevent the spread of infection is to wash our hands (Sing Happy Birthday twice with soap and warm water if you want to thoroughly annihilate all the bad bacteria and viruses that you pick up). But I worry that our addiction to sanitizing is preventing our immune systems from doing what they intrinsically do.
My Aunt Lizzy used to say “dirty kids are healthy kids” because prior to the germophobic generation we live in, people had faith in the immune system. Snots were wiped on t-shirts, mud was eaten, and utensils were shared. Children’s immune systems were constantly being challenged, kept busy, so that they developed a wide array of tools to defend against recurrent infection.
You see, our bodies are able to fight infection and remember the bacteria and viruses that we are exposed to, so when the same infection comes back around, we are more capable of defending against it. It seems we have a desperate need to keep bacteria away, and in turn we may actually be killing off the good bacteria that help our bodies maintain homeostasis.
Patients will often get upset when doctors refuse to prescribe antibiotics for viral infections. Most of the time, the common cold, sore throat, aches and pain are NOT caused by bacteria and therefore do NOT require a Z-Pak. Though minor viral illness can make you feel majorly ill, the treatment is to not treat. Supportive care such as increasing fluid intake, warm team, Tylenol for fevers will treat the symptoms, but the virus will run its course on its own. Antibiotics in this case will do more harm than good.
Take the intestinal infection C.Diff as an example. It’s a brutal illness marked by severe colitis, or inflammation of the colon, and watery diarrhea. Usually, a course of antibiotics (perhaps prescribed unnecessarily) wipes out the normal flora that protects the intestines. For up to six months after that balance is disturbed, there may be an overgrowth of the harmful bacteria, Clostridium difficile, which causes the infection. It’s a severe illness that occurs because the antibiotics have disrupted the body’s defense mechanisms.
Over-prescribing of antibiotics is causing a worrisome trend in medicine called anti-microbial resistance. You see, bacteria are smart. They adapt. When they encounter the same medicine time after time, they evolve and develop defenses that will resist the antibiotics’ effects. Therefore, infections that were previously well-treated with antibiotics become much harder to treat. Over the last 15 years, fewer drug companies are participating in research to develop new antibiotics and there are few new drugs on the horizon. Since the 1940s, antibiotics have been helping us save lives and prolong the human lifespan. But the time may come where we cannot rely on them as we do now. The threat of antimicrobial resistance is truly a threat to global health.
Chances are you will never experience any of the gory diseases I described earlier. But if we don’t stop over-sanitizing and over-prescribing your chances of successful treatment down the line may be compromised if you ever do acquire one of those awful infections. Wash your hands, cover your cough and if your doctor tells you that antibiotics are not necessary, don’t argue with her.
Check out these helpful links for more info:
http://www.cdc.gov/drugresistance/index.html
http://www.cdc.gov/handwashing/
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/06/13/science/antibiotic-misuse-turns-treatable-to-incurable.html
http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40A13FC3D550C738FDDA10894DD404482
Editor’s note: This column was first published Sept. 1, 2012.
Alexis Hugelmeyer, D.O. is the wife of Michael, mother of Isabella and Lance, and a family physician whose passion is hands-on manipulation for treatment and healing of any and every type of medical problem. She is the director of community outreach education at Peconic Bay Medical Center and also a private practitioner in Riverhead, where she has founded The Suah Center for Natural Healthcare. A graduate of Villanova University and New York College of Osteopathic Medicine, she lives in Baiting Hollow.
The survival of local journalism depends on your support.
We are a small family-owned operation. You rely on us to stay informed, and we depend on you to make our work possible. Just a few dollars can help us continue to bring this important service to our community.
Support RiverheadLOCAL today.