Amoxicillin alone has a little effect on the bacteria that cause the urinary tract infection, it works on some strains of the bacteria that cause the urinary tract infection (uti) but recently these bacteria have developed resistance against amoxicillin.
amoxicillin is an old antibiotic, more to that, amoxicillin’s action is not specific on this type of bacteria.
but, amoxicillin in combination with Clavulanic acid (amoxicillin + Clavulanic acid) can kill the bacteria that causes your uti, the brand name for these two drugs combination is called co-Amoxiclav or Augmentin.
remember if you started to take a co-Amoxiclav course to finish the whole course given by your doctor even if the symptoms go away because if you take Co-amoxiclav for two or three days and you start to feel some improvement in your condition and the pain goes away and you decide to not complete the rest of the course the bacteria will come back and come back stronger and then even the Co-amoxiclav may not be enough to overpower it.
But be careful if you are taking other drugs at the same time or if you have a penicillin allergy. if you have penicillin allergy do not use Co-amoxiclav or even amoxicillin alone.
in the picture below the co-amoxiclav that I used when I was ill.
I’m a pharmacist, by the way, am not saying that amoxicillin never works on the UTI I’m just suggesting that there are better alternatives to amoxicillin when it comes to treating UTI, these alternatives are nitrofurantoin, ciprofloxacin, fosfomycin, cephalexin (Keflex), Ceftriaxone (Rocephin) and levofloxacin.
why doesn’t the amoxicillin work on uti?
to answer this question we have to look at the bacteria that causes the urinary tract infection, what bacteria causes the urinary tract infection (UTI)? most of the time it’s Escherichia coli or E. coli, and sometimes it’s Klebsiella or others.
amoxicillin doesn’t limit the growth of these types of bacteria very well, it’s an antibiotic designed to work on other types of bacteria better than it does on the E. coli and Klebsiella.
although it works on some strains of these bacteria, even those strains have developed resistance to amoxicillin recently so it doesn’t work on them anymore.
amoxicillin is originally used to treat ear, nose, and throat infections basically.
for this reason, it’s better to use the drug Co-amoxiclav (also known as Augmentin) which is a combination of the two drugs Amoxicillin and Clavulanic acid this combination is capable of killing the bacteria that causes the uti a lot better than amoxicillin alone does.
again if you have penicillin allergy use neither amoxicillin alone nor Amoxicillin/clavulanic acid combination.
what is the dosage of amoxicillin for the uti?
if you insist on taking amoxicillin to treat your uti or if had some pain due to a uti and you found some amoxicillin capsules in your home pharmacy (although I don’t recommend it) be sure to take the dose right.
take one capsule of amoxicillin (500 mg) three times daily after meal.
if you decided to take Co-amoxiclav instead, as I advised you to do, take one 625 mg Co-amoxiclav tablet three times daily after meal or take one 1000 mg Co-amoxiclav tablet two times daily after meal.
ps: these doses are to be used for adults only, more than 18 years old, take caution if you are taking other medicines that might interact with amoxicillin or if you had diarrhea after using amoxicillin, discontinue its use and go to the doctor immediately.
in general, amoxicillin is a safe drug but it have some side effects like nausea, vomiting, rashes, and diarrhea.
if you are taking medication for gout disease or if you are taking oral contraceptive pills consult your doctor before taking amoxicillin or co-amoxiclav (augmentin).
bacterial resistance to amoxicillin is increasing worldwide because of the widespread use of this antibiotic across the globe. so, I don’t suggest that you take this antibiotic on a disease that it is very unlikely will treat.
the chances of amoxicillin to treat UTI is very low and by that, you will be increasing the problem that mankind is suffering from which is antibiotic resistance.
you will be just giving the bacteria some weak antibiotic to train on it and get stronger, and when bacteria get stronger you will have to use other antibiotics that are more powerful than amoxicillin. so, why waste your time.
now we will go and discuss another question, the question is: if a woman is pregnant and have a UTI at the same time (pregnant women are highly vulnerable to getting a UTI) is amoxicillin safe for her to use it to treat her UTI?
is amoxicillin the only choice for her to treat her uti? or is it the best choice for her in this case?
the first question: yes amoxicillin is relatively safe to use by the pregnant women to treat their UTI but you should take caution because it’s not like one hundred percent safe so it’s better to consult your doctor before taking it.
for breastfeeding women, amoxicillin can be excreted through breast milk so it is not safe for the breastfeeding women but is relatively safe for pregnant women.
the second question: is amoxicillin the only choice for pregnant women to treat urinary tract infections (uti)?
no, it’s not, there many other choices of antibiotics that are more powerful than amoxicillin on killing the bacteria and that work specifically on the urinary tract infections meaning that it is specialized in killing the types of bacteria that cause the UTI and eradicating them completely so that it can’t come back.
the third question: well obviously you should know the answer by now, no amoxicillin is not the best choice there are some other choices of antibiotics that their safety is just as the safety of amoxicillin for pregnant women and are more effective.
by the way, co-amoxiclav (Amoxicillin/clavulanic acid) is one of them and it’s safe just as amoxicillin alone for the pregnant women and a lot more effective than amoxicillin alone.
pregnant women are always prone to diseases like the UTI, during pregnancy due to hormonal changes your intestinal and vaginal flora (the good bacteria that live inside your intestine) composition can be disturbed.
this will lead to all kinds of problems that regularly affect pregnant women like bloating, diarrhea, constipation, and infections like vaginal infections and off course UTI.
to prevent this, many doctors prescribe probiotics formulas that contain a wide range of probiotics strains which will restore the order in your gut and vagina thereby will prevent UTI.
although I don’t recommend taking any probiotics formula if you are pregnant and already having a UTI, I certainly recommend taking probiotics like renew life women’s probiotics as a precautionary measure against UTI if you are pregnant.
check renew life women’s probiotics price on amazon, it contains 90 Billion CFU (individual bacterium).
so instead of taking amoxicillin and make things worse take a probiotics formula and rid yourself of a lot of problems including UTI.
we now arrive at another question which is how fast does amoxicillin work on UTI?
well, this depends on the dosage form that you have taken, meaning if it’s an amoxicillin capsule or a suspension, if it’s a capsule then it’s gonna take it 2 hours to reach its maximum levels in the blood, I have taken a lot of amoxicillin capsules in my life so in my experience it begins to work after less than half an hour from swallowing it and reach its maximum effect, it’s maximum concentration in the blood, after 2 hours from swallowing the capsule Then the levels of amoxicillin in the blood will begin to decrease gradually till it reaches it’s lowest point after 8 hours from administration.
that’s why the dose for amoxicillin is every 8 hours so that just right before the levels of amoxicillin in the blood drop you can have another capsule to adjust the concentration of amoxicillin in the blood back to normal.
in the case of amoxicillin suspensions amoxicillin will reach it’s maximum effect sooner than the capsule, because it will take it just one hour so it will work faster than the amoxicillin capsule, then you know the rest, the levels will begin to drop to the lowest point before 8 hours from swallowing the suspension.
the same goes for co-amoxiclav (Amoxicillin/clavulanic acid), the time that co-amoxiclav will take to work on UTI is the same as amoxicillin although as I said co-amoxiclav will work better than amoxicillin alone.
thanks for staying with me, goodbye.