The largest-ever global study involving Monash Health researchers has found the decades long “tradition” of administering a two-week course of antibiotics for bloodstream infection may not be necessary.
‘We showed that whether you had one week or two weeks of treatment, a similar proportion of people were still alive,’ said Associate Professor Benjamin Rogers, infectious diseases physician and clinical researcher at Monash Health and Monash University.
‘The key learning from our study is that it is not how sick you are at the start that determines how long you should be treated for.’
Globally, around three million people die from bloodstream infection each year.
The research finding could lead to a reduction in the time people spend on antibiotics, helping to stem rising antibiotic resistance.
Prescribing shorter courses of antibiotics could also reduce the number of patients who suffer side effects and reduce health system costs.
Over 3,600 adult patients hospitalised with sepsis due to bloodstream infection took part in the BALANCE trial, at 74 hospitals in 7 countries.
The research was led by the Sunnybrook Research Institute in Canada, with the Australian sites co-ordinated by Monash Health and Monash University, supported by the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council.
To read the research paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine, please visit: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2404991