Infusion-related adverse events (IRAEs) such as nausea, vomiting, fever, chills, and thrombophlebitis that are associated with amphotericin B therapy often lead clinicians to prescribe a number of adjunctive pretreatment medications in an attempt to reduce the incidence and severity of these events. The purpose of this study was to determine the incidence of IRAEs during the first week of systemic amphotericin B therapy and to identify pretreatment regimens that are effective in preventing these IRAEs. Three hundred ninety-seven adult inpatients receiving amphotericin B therapy were prospectively monitored, and data regarding IRAEs and pretreatment regimens were collected. Of these patients, 282 (71%) developed at least one IRAE during the first 7 days of therapy. The IRAEs most commonly reported were fever (51% of patients) and chills (28%), followed by nausea (18%), headache (9%), and thrombophlebitis (5%). The most common regimens included diphenhydramine, a corticosteroid, acetaminophen, and heparin, administered alone or in combination with these or other drugs. Overall, common pretreatment regimens were similar in efficacy to no pretreatment in the prevention of IRAEs. Thus empirical premedication for IRAEs associated with amphotericin B cannot be routinely advocated; instead, patients should be treated when symptoms first arise and then premedicated for subsequent amphotericin B infusions.
Antibiotic prescribing information was prospectively collected on 1822 hospitalized patients treated for suspected or documented bacterial pneumonia. Antibacterial therapy with a single antibiotic was employed in more than 50 percent of the patients, with cefazolin, cefuroxime, ampicillin, and ceftriaxone sodium representing the most commonly employed agents. Combination therapy using two antibiotics was employed in approximately 30 percent of patients with the aminoglycosides, particularly gentamicin, used extensively. A satisfactory outcome was achieved in approximately 80 percent of patients with a community- or institutional-acquired pneumonia; only 66 percent of nosocomial pneumonias had a satisfactory outcome. An important observation was the apparently common practice of switching patients to an oral antibiotic regimen after an average of seven days of antibiotics and subsequently discharging the patient. No difference was observed in the patterns of clinical response or duration of therapy for culture-positive versus culture-negative patients. The results of this surveillance program can serve as a basis for comparison of institution-specific drug utilization evaluation programs.
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