Antibiotics have saved millions of lives. Minor injuries used to become infected (frequently), causing disability and/or death. That is relatively uncommon now.
But…
Links to dementia later in life.
https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-discover-a-strange-n…
That is an interesting study! Although it only focused on women I would like to add that my dad was prone to Pneumonia right around the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays when I was growing up. Sometimes he would end up in the hospital and sometimes he would recover at home. Each of those many times he would receive antibiotics. I do know that over his many years the doctors kept upgrading the type or strength of the prescriptions until he was at the very strongest. That was the case for several years. Before I was caring for my dad I recall the doctor saying that what he takes is the strongest and there is nothing beyond that. Obviously my dad’s body was so used to the strength that it ended up not doing anything to eliminate the virus anymore. Also, he had a couple of surgeries while I cared for him and I will say that each time the anesthesia did seem to impair his memory and/or cognitive ability. I have read that the older you get the worse the response of anesthesia can get to your memory.
Robyn
I don’t find the connection strange at all. Antibiotics alter the gut microbiome in a negative way. The normal several or 1-week course is a brief interruption. But this study looks at people who had taken an antibiotic for at least 2 months. That is significant disruption. And the gut-brain connection has been documented for a while now, including the impact of the gut microbiome on various cognitive and other brain functions.
=sheila
I mostly avoided antibiotics. The one condition I had maybe 15 years ago is that I started getting sinus infections. I do the treatment, and within a year or so I’d get another one. I think after the third one they did a CAT scan(?) and determined that one of my sinuses was almost closed off (likely from scar tissue due to allergies). So they scheduled a roto-rooter for me. Since then, no problems. In fact, I can breathe through my nose again (I hadn’t been able to very well for most of my life, which I didn’t really notice until I could).
1poorguy
Also, he had a couple of surgeries while I cared for him and I will say that each time the anesthesia did seem to impair his memory and/or cognitive ability. I have read that the older you get the worse the response of anesthesia can get to your memory.
I began learning about this after my husband’s last surgery—his leg salvage surgery, which involved -1/2 hours of general anesthesia. There was a clear memory impact. We learned from a neurologist at MSK that cognitive effects from anesthesia can appear after age 70. And I discovered from my search of the research literature—from a realization sparked by an article I had just written on a guy’s research involved mitochondria in skin cells—that it appears in older, but not younger, people because it’s an issue of increasing numbers of mitochondria that have been damaged by the anesthesia, and there are no longer a sufficient number of health mitochondria to pick up the slack. The degree of this imbalance determines how severe or not the cognitive deficits are. I’ve heard of a few people who ended up with dementia post-surgery. So the scientists studying this have learned that it’s the impact on mitochondria that’s the cause. But they don’t yet have a preventive or a therapeutic.
It’s scary. And I made sure, when I saw the ankle surgeon who will be doing my ankle transplant, that he will be able to do it without general anesthesia—local only.
=sheila
Does amnesia anesthesia count?
I get regular colonoscopies. Apparently I am awake (but groggy), but I don’t remember a thing starting from the “count backwards from 10”. I often “wake up” in the car on the way home, but obviously I was ambulatory enough to get into the car. So I’m not really “out”.
Unlike the two surgeries I’ve had in the past three years where I was OUT. (Except for the bit when they woke me up to ask me questions to make sure they weren’t damaging anything important.)
1poorguy
Amnesia anesthesia doesn’t count.
=sheila
I’ve been on tons of antibiotics in my life, especially in middle age when I got bronchitis or pneumonia several times a year. And when chronic Lyme was finally diagnosed, I was on IV antibiotics for a year.
The only time the hubster was on an antibiotic the entire time I’ve know him (~40 years) was about 10 years ago when he was bitten by a tick and took doxycycline for 10 days to prevent Lyme.
I’ve often said that he has my dementia.
alstromeria: I’ve often said that he has my dementia.
My dad usta say, “Insanity is hereditary - you get it from your kids.”
CNC