Azithromycin, With or Without Loperamide, to Treat Travelers' Diarrhea

• Status: Completed
• Trial end date: 2003-08-01
• Target enrollment: 0
• Participant gender: All

Summary

In a previous study azithromycin proved as efficacious as levofloxacin in the treatment of travelers' diarrhea in Mexico. Because the addition of loperamide to some antibiotics (e.g., trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole and ofloxacin) has proven more efficacious than antibiotic alone in the treatment of travelers' diarrhea, we decided to study the addition of loperamide to azithromycin.

US adults with acute diarrhea in Guadalajara Mexico were randomized to receive azithromycin in two different doses or loperamide plus azithromycin.

The duration of diarrhea was shorter (11 hours) in the combination-treated group compared to the antibiotic-treated groups (34 hours). The percentage of subjects continuing to pass 6 or more unformed stools in the first 24 hours was less (1.7%) in the combination-treated group than in the antibiotic-treated groups (20%).

We feel loperamide should routinely be added to an antibiotic to optimize treatment of travelers' diarrhea.

• Phase: Phase 4
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers?: No

Details

• Lead Sponsor: The University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston
• Treatments: Antidiarrheals; Azithromycin; Loperamide

Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

• Eligible subjects included men or women, recently arrived in Mexico, at least 18 years of age, who developed acute diarrhea, which was defined as passage of 3 or more unformed stools in the preceding 24 hours accompanied by one or more signs or symptoms of enteric infection (e.g., nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps, tenesmus, passage of grossly bloody stools or fecal urgency) with a duration of illness of less than or equal to 72 hours.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Exclusion criteria included pregnancy, breast feeding, an unstable medical condition, taking two or more doses of an antidiarrheal medication in the 24 hours before enrollment or any number of doses of symptomatic therapy within 2 hours of enrollment, or receiving an antimicrobial drug with expected activity against enteric bacterial pathogens within 7 days prior to enrollment.