In: Nursing
how you would respond to a patient who presents with a “viral” infection. Describe your response to his or her request for an antibiotic. Include a description of what the patient presents with to the office visit.
Patient complaints of headache, running nose, sneezing, scratching like symptoms in throat, general body pain, chills and fever. Symptoms may exist for 1 or 2 weeks. Secretions of nose may be thin and after three or four days may become green in colour. Eyes may be red and watery too. Dry cough may be also there after infection.
These are symptoms of viral infection common cold. There are 100 varieties of virus which can cause common cold.
If the patient requests for antibiotic , we can explain that she is infected with a virus . Antibiotics have no effect on virus and also it cannot reduce the replication of virus. Antibiotics work only on bacteria by inhibiting growth of their genetic material and also they dissolve cell walls, protein in bacteria .
Viral common cold needs to be treated symptomatically like warm salt water gargles for scratchy throat, adequate fluid intake for headache, expectorants , vitamin c . Rest and sleep are most important .