Abstract
To 10 inpatients with respiratory infection (mean age: 73.4 yr), azithromycin (AZM) was administered at a dose of 250 or 500 mg once a day for 3 days to determine its blood concentration. Although determination of blood concentration with time failed in individual subjects, the blood concentrations that were successfully determined coincided well with the results obtained by extrapolation from changes in the blood concentration in the Phase I successive administration test of AZM.
To 21 patients with respiratory infection (1 case of acute bronchitis, 5 of pneumonia, 5 of chronic bronchitis, 3 of bronchiectasia+infection, 3 of old pulmonary tuberculosis+infection, 2 of pulmonary emphysema+infection, 1 of bronchial asthma + infection, 1 of pulmonary emphysema+pulmonary tuberculosis+infection), the drug was orally administered at a dose of 250 or 500mg once a day for 3 days to examine its clinical effect and safety. Except for 1 not evaluated case, the clinical result was assessed to be excellent in 8, good in 7 and fair in 2, and poor in 3 cases. Bacteriologically, 2 strains, 1 of Streptococcus pneumoniae and 1 of Haemophilus influenzae, were isolated. These were completely eradicated by AZM administration. As for adverse reactions due to AZM administration, diarrhea appeared in 1 case, increased eosinophils in 4 and elevated ALP in 1.
