Comparison of Clinical Efficacy of Fosfomycin (FOM) and Kanamycin (KM) in Bacillary Dysentery by Double Blind Method

Abstract

A double blind study was performed using kanamycin (KM) as the control drug in order to make a strict objective evaluation of the efficacy and usefulness of fosfomycin (FOM) in the treatment of bacillary dysentery patients or carriers. The following results were obtained.
1.The MICs of FOM for 116 strains isolated from patients of this series distributed in a range between 0.2 and 25 μg/ml. None of the strains showed resistance to FOM, while there were 2 strains which were found resistant to KM.
2.With respect to the efficacy for symptoms, little or no significant difference was seen between the two groups, although the number of days required for disappearance of blood in stool was shorter for FOM group than for KM group with significant difference.
3.In both groups, good results were obtained for eradication of organisms. In particular, the efficacy rate of 100% recorded for patients of FOM group was higher significantly than that of 85.7% recorded for those of KM group.
4.All of the side effects observed were mild in nature, and no significant difference was seen in their incidences between the two groups. The examination of blood picture, liver and renal functions revealed little or no influences from treatment with either drug, although in one case of FOM group a slight elevation in S-GPT was seen.
From these results, FOM is considered to be a drug very useful in the treatment of patients with bacillary dysentery or carriers.