Antimicrobial Agents in Common Respiratory Infections of Children

ANTIMICROBIAL therapy for the acute respiratory infections of children can rarely be precise, for knowledge of the etiologic agent is usually not available when therapy must be started; it can be rational, however, if careful clinical and epidemiologic findings are supplemented with selected laboratory data. With the many therapeutic agents now available it is naturally tempting to "cover" most infections by the use of one or more antimicrobial drugs, particularly in small children, in whom bacterial infections are often subtle, occasionally progress with frightening rapidity to overwhelming septic complications and death, and are frequently caused by gram-negative as well as . . .