Chemotherapy for Pulmonary Disease Due to Mycobacterium kansasii: Efficacies of Some Individual Drugs

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
An evaluation of chemotherapy was made for 256 patients with pulmonary infection due to Mycobacterium kansasii. Studies of in vitro resistance of M. kansasii and Mycobacterium tuberculosis to various drugs revealed important differences between the two species that should be considered when planning chemotherapy. Partial or no in vitro resistance to 1 μg of isoniazid/ml did not adversely affect the time required for conversion of sputum from positive to negative, whereas complete resistance to isoniazid had a statistically significant (P < 0.001) adverse effect. All of the 115patients who received treatment that included rifampin (initial and retreatment) had sputum conversion within four months. However, for regimens that did not include rifampin, 127(90%) of 141 patients had conversion within four months (PM. kansasii. Since rifampin may be the most potent drug for treatment of this disease, the recommended combinations for initial treatment are (1) rifampin, streptomycin, isoniazid, and ethambutol, or (2) rifampin and two other drugs to which the organism is sensitive.

This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: