Antibiotic Resistance Mechanisms, Problems, and Solutions

Antimicrobial resistance is a growing problem in the world today. The Center for Disease Control cited antimicrobial resistance as the second-most significant health threat in 2014 (“CDC year in review: \u27Mission: Critical,\u27” 2014). It is estimated that 23,000 people die from infections caused by antibiotic resistant bacteria every year, and many more people are hospitalized due to drug resistant strains of microorganisms. Antimicrobial resistance makes treatment of infections more difficult, expensive, and dangerous. (“Antibiotic/Antimicrobial resistance,” 2010) The problems caused by drug resistant bacteria will affect almost everyone working in health care in some capacity, and this issue will likely only become more important in the future. Drug resistance is an issue that has developed over decades, as an inevitable and natural process of over administering and over-utilizing antimicrobial drugs. It is important for health care workers to understand how an antimicrobial agent functions, the mechanisms of drug resistance, how resistance develops, the problems caused by antimicrobial resistance, and the possible solutions to this problem