Targeted Antibiotics for Lower Respiratory Tract Infection with Corynebacterium striatum

To assess the impact of targeted antibiotic therapy on clinical outcomes of patients with lower respiratory tract (LRT) infection with Corynebacterium striatum (C. striatum).

A new propensity score-inverse probability of treatment weighting (IPTW) cohort study was conducted by using 10-year data. The study included LRT infection patients with respiratory secretions cultured positive for C. striatum simultaneously. The primary outcome was all-cause hospital mortality; the secondary outcomes included hospital stay, ICU stay and ventilation time. The safety outcomes were drug-related serum creatinine (Cr) increase and thrombocytopenia.

A total of 339 patients were included in the cohort, and 84 (24.78%) initiated vancomycin or linezolid therapy. In the new IPTW cohort, targeted antibiotic therapy did not improve all-cause hospital mortality (P=0.632), and the OR (95% CI) was 0.879 (0.519-1.488). Moreover, targeted antibiotic therapy was not associated with hospital stay (P=0.415), ICU stay (P=0.945) or ventilation time (P=0.885). The side effects of drug-related higher serum Cr (P=0.044) and thrombocytopenic levels (P=0.038) cannot be ignored.

Clinical benefits by vancomycin or linezolid targeted against LRT infection with C. striatum were limited and with drug-related side effects. A prospectively designed study is needed to further confirm the results.