This episode of Pediacast is brought to going to another episode of PDACast.

We are a pediatric podcast for moms and dads.

This is Dr. Mike coming to you from the campus of Nationwide Children's Hospital.

We're in Columbus, Ohio.

It's episode 593.

We're calling this one Smart Antibiotic Use, What Parents Need to Know. I want episode 593. We're calling this one smart antibiotic use, what parents need to know.

I want to welcome all of you to the program. We are so happy to have you with us this week.

As you likely know, antibiotics were a miracle drug when they were first introduced in the early to

mid-20th century, and they have in fact saved millions and millions of

lives. However, when they are overused or misused, they can lose their power. Bacteria can

evolve to evade the damage caused by these medications, which leads to antimicrobial resistance.

And this is a growing problem that impacts children and adults around the world because it means antibiotics can lose their effectiveness,

which leads to difficult to treat, and sometimes life-threatening infections and the need to develop

new drugs, which can be quite expensive. And these are dollars that could

have been spent developing treatments for non-infectious diseases if the antibiotics that we have

continued to work. So this week, we are exploring antimicrobial resistance and the importance

of stewardship programs aimed at preventing this resistance from occurring.

By the way, right out of the gate, let's get some definitions squared away.

Antibiotics target bacteria.

Antimicrobials, you'll also hear us use this word today.

It's a bigger classification that includes antibiotics, but it also includes drugs aimed at

stopping other kinds of microbes, such as viruses, fungus, or yeast, and parasites. So stick

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