In today's highly competitive world science and its inventions play a major role. The last hundred years have witnessed a tremendous change in life owing to the technical development by science. But there are two sides of every coin and science has its evil effects too. How can we forget the destruction caused by the atom bomb during the second world war? The atom bomb too is the creation of science and one of the deadliest and the worst. But these inventions that are made to make our human life better is one we should give much importance. Yes, I am talking about one such invention of science which has made our human life much better and that is the invention of Antibiotic Medicine.
Antibiotics

What is antibiotic? Well, it is defined as a substance produced by a micro organism which inhibits the growth or kills other organisms. To put it simple, it is a substance produced from micro-organisms ( bacteria, fungi etc ) that kills or slows down the growth of another kind of micro-organisms and hence they are known by the name "Antibiotics". There are certain medicines like Sulfonamide, Quinolona etc which are not produced from any micro-organisms but they work like antibiotics and hence are called Antibacterial.

Some basic facts
Louis Pasteur, the French Scientist, is known as the father of germ theory and bacteriology. In 1811, he together with Joubert showed that the Anthrax germ can multiply very quickly in sterile urine. But if the urine is left over open in room temperature then certain other germs enter into it  and they not only prevents the Anthrax germ from multiplying but also destroys them completely. This very experiment proved the fact that these external germs which entered the urine must have some qualities or products in them which destroys the Anthrax germ in the urine. Soon after that in 1936, Sulfanilamide is prepared in a chemical process in a laboratory. In England, May & Baker medicine factory first produced Sulfadiazine, the life giving medicine and during that period of time it was known by the name M & B 693. Then one fine day, people throughout the world heard from the English Parliament Sir Winston Chruchill's declaration, "Gentlemen, after M.B:693, Pneumonia is no longer a killer disease".

The golden age of antibiotics started from 1941. In the medicine market, the new medicine named Penicillin was available. Though Penicillin was discovered much earlier to this. The man who discovered this was Alexander Flemming and he became very famous with this discovery. After that different kind of life saving medicines and antibiotics were discovered.

The usage of Antibiotics
During this present age, the usage of antibiotic in medical treatments is very common and it has its own many fold benefits. But the bare fact is that it has a lot of abuses also. Why abuses? The use or application of antibiotics on a patient should be done with utmost care and  one should have a proper knowledge about it before starting any kind of diagnosis as such.. Mostly antibiotics are used in cases of fever ailment.

It would be wrong to say that almost all the fevers are related with germs, bacteria and microbes because there are fevers related with hot or cold conditions, heat strokes, or even due to cough and cold. It is important to mention here that in  these cases antibiotics are not required.

Before the use of antibiotics it is important to determine the kind of illness the patient is going through and if the very illness is related with bacteria and virus. It is also important to find out the area or parts of the body like liver, kidney etc getting effected with the illness. It is important to determine because different kinds of virus effects different parts of the body like Pneumococci or Mycobacteria effects the lungs.

There are three categories of treatment that are done with antibiotics namely....
1) Empirical
2) Definitive and
3) Prophylactic.

Things to be taken care off
Before using any antibiotics for treatment three things needs to be taken utmost care off:-

1) Whether the medicine will destroy the particular bacteria ( Bactericidal ) or will it stop its growth or multiplication ( Bacteriostatic ). It is always advisable to give the first option much preference.

2) It is to be noted that once the antibiotic is used how does it works with the functioning of the lever or other vital metabolic activities of the human body. It is also required to be taken care of upon which organ the medicine works better or what quantity of the medicine should be used so that it works best.

3) Care should be taken to find out about the side effects of the related medicines because some of the medicines like Sulfa and Penicillin can create an allergic condition among patients.

The type of illness determines the types of medicines to be used and its tenure. The medicine should be used until the illness or disease is completely cured. It is also required to be taken care of during the period of treatment that the medicine does not effect the lever, kidney and heart of patients and most importantly, the medicine should be dear in price so that it would be available to the patients belonging to the middle class and lower middle class levels.