Today more than ever, doctors in the ambulatory care and hospitals must effectively manage the use of antibiotics to control costs and preserve their usefulness. To achieve this goal, antibiotic management must evolve from simplistic antibiotic cost containment to more complex, appropriate use program that are founded on clinical outcomes-based pharmacoeconomic analyses. The successful application of pharmacoeconomic principles to antimicrobial therapy requires maximizing therapeutic effectiveness while minimizing costs, with the primary on pharmacokinetic considerations. This article reviews the various pharmacoeconomic factors that affect antibiotic costs in relation to patients and institutions. Cost-effectiveness studies of macrolides in pulmonary infections are presented in this study to illustrate the utility of these analyses.