Clostridium difficileInfection in Patients with Neutropenia

Citations Over TimeTop 10% of 2001 papers

Abstract

Clostridium difficile is the most important cause of nosocomial infectious diarrhea. The importance of C. difficile-associated diarrhea (CDAD) has been poorly investigated in patients with neutropenia who have hematologic malignancies. A retrospective chart review of all patients treated in the leukemia ward of a university medical center during 1991-2000 determined that 875 courses of myelosuppressive chemotherapy were administered. CDAD occurred in 7.0% of all cycles. In 8.2% of the patients, severe enterocolitis developed. Two patients died while they had diarrhea. However, in no patient was C. difficile infection clinically considered to be the primary cause of death. The response rate to oral metronidazole was 90.9%. These data indicate that C. difficile infection is not rare and should be suspected whenever a hospitalized patient with neutropenia develops diarrhea. Oral metronidazole can be recommended as initial drug of choice for treatment of patients with neutropenia who have hematologic malignancies and CDAD.

Related Papers

• → ComparativeIn VitroActivities of SMT19969, a New Antimicrobial Agent, against 162 Strains from 35 Less Frequently Recovered Intestinal Clostridium Species: Implications for Clostridium difficile Recurrence(2013)27 cited
• → Clostridium scindens Is Present in the Gut Microbiota during Clostridium difficile Infection: a Metagenomic and Culturomic Analysis(2018)24 cited
• → How should we respond to the highly toxogenic NAP1/ribotype 027 strain of Clostridium difficile?(2005)16 cited
• → Риск развития Clostridium difficile инфекции, связанный с применением различных групп антибиотиков и их сочетаний, у детей в онкологическом стационаре(2020)
• → Retraction for Amrane et al., “ Clostridium scindens Is Present in the Gut Microbiota during Clostridium difficile Infection: a Metagenomic and Culturomic Analysis”(2024)