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Antibiotic therapy in hematological neutropenic patients: what is the news?

Abstract

Bacterial infection is a very common complication in hematological neutropenic patients whose treatment is extremely challenging for several reasons. First, they are frequently caused by resistant pathogens (multidrug resistant (MDR)), and this may limit the availability of effective therapeutic weapons. Second, these patients often present peculiar pathophysiological conditions that may alter the pharmacokinetic behavior of antimicrobials, and this may explain the need for a new administration schedule and new dosing regimens of antibiotics in this setting. In an era in which there are only few new therapeutic weapons for the treatment of MDR bacterial infections, while advocating for new drugs, what could be effectively done nowadays is to increase the knowledge on appropriateness of the use of currently available drugs to improve clinical outcome and to preserve their activity.

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Correspondence to F Pea.

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Competing interests

FP received consulting fees from Astellas Pharma, Pfizer and Achaogen. FP also has been in the speaker bureau of Gilead, MSD Italy, Novartis, Pfizer and Sanofi Aventis.

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This article was published as part of a supplement that was supported by Novartis, MSD Italia, Roche, Celgene, GlaxoSmithKline, Sanofi, Gilead, Adienne, Italfarmaco, Pierre Fabre Pharmaceuticals with an unrestricted educational contribution to AREO—Associazione Ricerche Emato-Oncologiche (Genoa) and AMS—Associazione Malattie del Sangue (Milan) for the purpose of advancing research in acute and chronic leukemia.

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Pea, F. Antibiotic therapy in hematological neutropenic patients: what is the news?. Leukemia Suppl 1 (Suppl 2), S20–S21 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/leusup.2012.13

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