London - Doctors are over prescribing antibiotics for general sinus infections and associated conditions, probably due to the false assumption that it can assist in cases of protracted symptoms, researchers said on Friday.

Bacteria are known to cause rhino sinusitis which is a swelling of the sinuses, however a virus of the common cold is more often the culprit and hence antibiotics hardly ever work, the researchers wrote in the journal Lancet.

But still doctors prescribe antibiotics more than they actually should. For instance, in the U S, around 80 % of the patients with sinus are prescribed an antibiotic, where as, in Europe the figure ranges from 72 % to 92 %. (more…)