Cimetidine in the treatment of herpesvirus infections

In August 1977 a patient developed herpes zoster just before she commenced a course of cimetidine (Tagamet; Smith, Kline & French) for a chronic gastric ulcer. She experienced both rapid relief of the ulcer symptoms and, rather unexpectedly, dramatic relief of the herpetic pain and rapid disappearance of the eruption. On the basis of this observation cimetidine was prescribed to 21 patients with herpes zoster. The results continued to be encouraging in all but 3 patients. The trial was therefore extended to other herpesvirus infections. In all but 1 of 7 patients with herpes labialis the blisters were aborted, and in 1 patient with herpes keratitis the result was also encouraging, the attacks being markedly shortened in duration and reduced in frequency. The results of this preliminary trial warrant a systematic scientific inquiry into the potential role of cimetidine in the treatment of hypesvirus infection, as well as a study of the mechanisms involved.