To minimize the health risks of a non-mainstream treatment. 1  Discuss it with your doctor. It might have side effects or interact with other medicines. 2  Find out what the research says about it. 3  Choose practitioners carefully. 4  Tell all of your doctors and practitioners about all of the different types of treatments you use.
Skewed expectations may be one reason why antibiotics are over-prescribed, even for viral infections. In a phone survey, researchers asked 493 people how long they thought a case of ACI (acute cough illness, a.k.a. a cold that causes coughing) should last. At the same time, they looked at the existing medical literature to see how long ACI actually lasts on average. Survey respondents guessed that a cough should last 7-9 days. The literature, by contrast, showed that the mean duration of a cough is almost 18 days. Advertisement.
How Long Does Bronchitis Last? Acute bronchitis typically lasts two to three weeks, but coughing may persist for up to eight weeks in some people. Chronic bronchitis doesn't ever go away. With this type of bronchitis, coughing jags can last for three months before the next episode.