Pneumonia - Treatment

Pneumonia - Treatment

Bacterial pneumonia

Doctors use antibiotics to treat pneumonia caused by bacteria, the most common cause of the condition. Antibiotics have a high cure rate for pneumonia.⁵

Your doctor will choose your antibiotic based on a number of things, including your age, your symptoms and how severe they are, and whether you need to go to the hospital. The number of days you take antibiotics depends on your general health, how serious your pneumonia is, and the type of antibiotic you are taking.

Most people see some improvement in symptoms in 2 to 3 days. Unless you get worse during this time, your doctor usually will not change your treatment for at least 3 days.

Getting started on antibiotics soon after getting pneumonia may help recovery.⁵

If there is no improvement or if your symptoms get worse, you may need a culture and a sensitivity test. These tests help identify the organism that is causing your symptoms. These tests also help your doctor find out whether the bacteria is resistant to the antibiotic.

If you do not need to go to the hospital for pneumonia, it is not usually necessary to identify the organism causing the pneumonia before starting treatment. If you do go to the hospital, you will probably have some testing to identify the bacteria.

You likely will not have to go to the hospital unless you:

• Are older than 65.
• Have other health problems, such as COPD, heart failure, asthma,شer disease.
• Cannot care for yourself or would not be able to tell anyone if your symptoms got worse.
• Have severe illness that reduces the amount of oxygen getting to your tissues.
• Have chest pain caused by inflammation of the lining of the lung (pleurisy) so you are not able to cough up mucus effectively and clear your lungs.
• Are being treated outside a hospital and are not getting better (such as your shortness of breath not improving).
• Are not able to eat or keep food down, so you need to take fluids through a vein (intravenous).ش