QuestionHi, I am wondering why some (most?) medicines seem to actually have no effect.
For example I went to the doctor yesterday with 2 main problems: a bad case of poison ivy on my hand (and lesser outbreaks in several other areas), and a sore throat that was turning into a cold.
The doctor was helpful and gave me prescriptions, first for a cream to put on the poison ivy (betamethasone), and second for an antibiotic for the throat/cold (azithromicine I think).
Today, my sore throat/cold is worse than yesterday, and the poison ivy is exactly the same. I also took dayquil yesterday which had no effect (either at suppressing the symptoms temporarily or helping out long term).
Why is it that medicine doesn't seem to work? Would stronger doses be better? If so, why not prescribe strong doses all the time?
If the answer is that the medicine takes time to work, then I wonder what the overall benefit is anyway. For example my poison ivy is 6 days old, it will probably clear up on its own in 4 or 5 days. So the goal of seeing a doctor is to drastically shorten that time. Is this cream only good to clear it up 1 day sooner?
I wonder the same thing about my cold - will the antibiotics make it go away, or just clear it up one day earlier than it would have gone away on its own?
Is it better to just not take any medicine at all?
Answerthis gets into a big discussion... but I will summarize....
sore throat.... 90% of these are viral which means antibiotics don't help them anyways... they run their course with or without treatment in 10 days or so.
Poison ivy... oral steroids help, but you have to have them in your system for about 3 days before you will see benefit, and you need to take them for at least 12 days. An appropriate dose is good, too much doesn't help any more.
So your last questions.... it is better to take nothing at all for the cold but the poison ivy problem can be shortened and lessened by the steroids.
