Penicillin and other antibiotic allergy

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What is Penicillin and other antibiotic allergy?

Penicillin allergy and other other antibiotic allergies are not diseases on their own, but the clinical situations commonly encountered in medicine are due to adverse drug reactions.

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As the name suggests, it is an allergic or hypersensitivity reaction towards penicillin or other antibiotics.

It can occur in many parts of the body as in any allergic reaction. However the commonly affected parts are:

skin
airways
gut
face
generalised

Who gets Penicillin and other antibiotic allergy?

Penicillin allergy and other antibiotic allergy are considered as adverse drug reaction. Drug reactions are responsible for 2-5% of hospital admissionis in the US. From these data alone they are considered to be common in hospital practice.

Predisposing Factors

Penicillin allergy can happen in anyone of any age. However, higher incidence of adverse drug reactions is found in females when compared to males. Although penicillin allergy can happen in any age, it is suspected that elderly patients have increased incidence of this clinical entity. This may be due to higher cases of diagnosis as compared to young adults.

Progression

Penicillin administration can cause allergic reactions through several mechanisms. Generally it can cause all types of hypersensitivity reactions, including type I, II, III and IV (see Introduction to Allergy and Hypersensitivity).

Usually penicillin allergy occurs within 1 hour of drug administration. However, sometimes it can take longer. Other antibiotics of the same group (beta-lactams) like amoxycillin can produce allergic reactions unpredictably regarding the duration of allergy development.

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