What is it about?
Clostridium (now Clostridioides) difficile infection has become the most frequent cause of hospital-acquired infectious diarrhoea in developed countries, with rising mortality, recurrences and treatment failures. Standard treatments are given by mouth, which can be a problem in critically ill patients whose gut is not working. Tigecycline is a broad-spectrum intravenous antibiotic that is active against C. difficile in the laboratory and is largely eliminated in the faeces, reaching high concentrations in the gut. We reviewed laboratory studies, animal studies and clinical case reports on tigecycline for this infection. The evidence, although limited, suggests that tigecycline could be an alternative option for critically ill patients or for infections that do not respond to standard therapy.
Featured Image
Photo by Diana Polekhina on Unsplash
Why is it important?
Severe and refractory C. difficile infections have few effective options, especially when oral drugs cannot reach the colon. This review summarizes the rationale and available evidence for tigecycline as a salvage or adjunctive treatment and highlights the need for controlled clinical studies.
Perspectives
Looking for alternatives for the sickest C. difficile patients was an early theme of my research. Tigecycline is an interesting example of how pharmacokinetics - in this case its faecal excretion - can suggest new uses for an existing antibiotic.
Professor Stefano Di Bella
Universita degli Studi di Trieste
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Is tigecycline a suitable option for Clostridium difficile infection? Evidence from the literature, International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents, July 2015, Elsevier,
DOI: 10.1016/j.ijantimicag.2015.03.012.
You can read the full text:
Contributors
The following have contributed to this page
