Granulocyte-colony stimulating factors as adjunctive therapy for diabetic foot infections

G-CSF increases the release of neutrophil endothelial progenitor cells from the bone marrow, and improves neutrophil functions, which are often impaired in people with diabetes.

To examine the effects of adjunctive G-CSF compared with placebo or no growth factor added to usual care on rates of infection, cure and wound healing in people with diabetes who have a foot infection.

We searched the Cochrane Wounds Group Specialised Register (Searched 16/3/09); the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (The Cochrane Library, issue 1 2009); Ovid MEDLINE (1950 to March Week 1 2009); Ovid EMBASE (1980 to 2009 Week 11); EBSCO CINAHL (1982 to March Week 2 2009); LookSmart's Find Articles (January 1990 to January 2008); conference proceedings and references lists in the included studies.

Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) that evaluated the effect of adding G-CSF to usual care in people with a diabetic foot infection.

Three review authors independently assessed trial eligibility, methodological quality and extracted data. Relative risk (RR), or for continuous outcomes, mean differences (MD), with 95% confidence intervals (CI) were reported. In the case of low or no heterogeneity studies were pooled using a fixed-effect model.

We identified and included five eligible trials with a total of 167 patients. The investigators administered various G-CSF preparations, at different doses and for different durations of time. Adding G-CSF did not significantly affect the likelihood of resolution of infection or wound healing, but it was associated with a significantly reduced likelihood of lower extremity surgical interventions (RR 0.37; 95 % CI 0.20 to 0.68), including amputation (RR 0.41; 95 % CI 0.18 to 0.95). Moreover, providing G-CSF reduced the duration of hospital stay (MD, -1.40 days; 95 % CI, -2.27 to -0.53 days), but did not significantly affect the duration of systemic antibiotic therapy (MD, -0.27 days; 95 % CI, -1.30 to 0.77 days).

The available evidence is limited, but suggests that adjunctive G-CSF treatment in people with a diabetic foot infection, including infected ulcers, does not appear to increase the likelihood of resolution of infection or healing of the foot ulcer. However, it does appear to reduce the need for surgical interventions, especially amputations, and the duration of hospitalisation. Clinicians might consider adding G-CSF to the usual treatment of diabetic foot infections, especially in patients with a limb-threatening infection, but it is not clear which patients might benefit.