Inhaled anti-infectives

What are Inhaled anti-infectives?

Inhaled anti-infectives are agents that act locally, in the lungs to treat infection. Inhaled antibiotics are used to treat bacterial infection and antiviral medicines treat viral infections. These anti-infectives are inhaled either as dry powder or as a solution via a nebulizer.

Antibiotics currently marketed for inhalation include nebulized and dry powder forms of tobramycin and colistin and nebulized aztreonam.

Albuterol is the most commonly prescribed inhaled medication. Providers commonly prescribe short-acting bronchodilators, or rescue inhalers, for COPD and asthma. Providers also sometimes prescribe short-acting bronchodilators for other respiratory illnesses like bronchitis.

Albuterol is used to prevent and treat difficulty breathing, wheezing, shortness of breath, coughing, and chest tightness caused by lung diseases such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD; a group of diseases that affect the lungs and airways).

Based on spirometry and reported side effects, inhalation of nebulized amoxicillin clavulanic acid seems to be safe and well tolerated, both in stable patients with COPD as in those experiencing a severe exacerbation.

Currently, there are two FDA-approved inhaled antibiotics: tobramycin and aztreonam. Interestingly, another two, levofloxacin and colistin, are only approved in the European Union and Canada and are still undergoing extensive phase III studies

An inhaler is a device that gets medicine directly into a person’s lungs. The medicine is a mist or spray that the person breathes in. Unlike a pill or liquid that is swallowed, an inhaler gets medicine right to the lungs. This helps people with asthma because the medicine works quickly to open up narrowed airways.