General Interest in the gut microbiome has been steadily increasing over the last decade as diagnostic tools for exploration have become readily available, which has increased information available and lead to novel innovation in the way some diseases are treated. Gut microbiota contributes to host health much more than previously thought, increasing the potential for healing bodies with therapies that use the body’s natural defense mechanisms as an alternative to current practices that use antibiotics. This in turn reduces the risk of antibiotic resistance. Treatment initiatives that focus on drug therapy can lead to overuse of broad-spectrum antibiotics, which have been shown to have detrimental effects on the human body and can cause many gut issues. In addition, antibiotic resistance remains a critical public health challenge, necessitating the exploration of alternative therapeutic strategies to traditional antibiotics. This review examines the impact of antibiotic use on gut microbiota and consequences on host health and immunity both short- and long-term effects, with a focus on the potential for microbial dysbiosis. The connection between dysbiosis and antibiotic resistance is explored as well as the potential for recovery through alternative therapies, including microbiota-modulating and targeted antimicrobial therapies, by assessing their short- and long-term potential as antimicrobial alternatives.
Peltak et al. (Mon,) studied this question.