Though antibiotics help in treating infections successfully, it can prove to be harmful sometimes.
Emphasizing this point, according to a new study, giving certain antibiotics to children escalate their risks of getting some bowel diseases like Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis, Health Day reported.
Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is the inflammatory conditions of the colon and small intestine. Abdominal pain, vomiting, diarrhea, bloody stools, poor appetite, severe internal cramps or muscle spasms in the region of pelvis and weight loss are some symptoms of the disease. According to an estimate from Crohn's & Colitis Foundation of America, about 100,000 American children are affected with IBD.
Previous studies have found a link between bowel disease and antibiotics. However, the current study published online Sep.24 in the journal of Pediatrics is the first large study to prove the link.
For the study, the researchers examined data that included one million children, participating in a UK based health network. All the participants aged 17 or younger were followed for more than two years.
A significant number of children were found taking antibiotics at least once in their lives (64 percent), and some taking the specific antianaerobic antibiotics (58 percent) like penicillin, amoxicillin, tetracyclines, metronidazole and cefoxitin.
During the study, about 750 children were diagnosed either with Crohn's or ulcerative colitis. Antibiotic use was found escalating the risks of bowel disease (84 percent), especially five times higher while taking within the first year after birth.
Apart from that, the researchers also succeeded in finding a link between dosage and the disease.
"There appears to be a 'dose response' effect," Health Day quoted Dr. Matt Kronman, assistant professor of pediatric infectious diseases at the University Of Washington School Of Medicine in Seattle, as saying. "The more antibiotics children took, the more their risk increased."
The risk was found coming down as the child grew old. However, the study couldn't find any link between tetracycline and bowel disease.
The study also cited the 49 million pediatric prescriptions a year contributing to 1,700 new bowel disease cases every year.
"Childhood antianaerobic antibiotic exposure is associated with IBD development," the authors concluded.
Recently another study published in the online Aug. 21 issue of International Journal of Obesity found giving antibiotics before six months putting children at a higher risks of becoming overweight by 38 months of age.
