Spontaneous bacterial peritonitis in liver cirrhosis: treatment and prophylaxis

Spontaneous bacterial peritonitis in liver cirrhosis is due to the passage of intestinal bacteria into intestinal lymph vessels, systemic circulation and ascitic fluid. It may occur in patients with severe portal hypertension and hepatic failure, impaired reticuloendothelial phagocytic activity and low ascitic fluid opsonic activity. Spontaneous bacterial peritonitis is a monomicrobial infection usually caused by gram-negative bacteria. The treatment of choice of spontaneous bacterial peritonitis is cefotaxime. Several subgroups of cirrhotic patients have been shown to be predisposed to develop spontaneous bacterial peritonitis, including cases with gastrointestinal hemorrhage, patients with high serum bilirubin and low ascitic fluid protein concentration (< 1 g/dl), and patients who had recovered from an episode of spontaneous bacterial peritonitis. Since spontaneous bacterial peritonitis is associated with a relatively high in-hospital mortality rate (20-40%), prophylactic measures to prevent this infection are required. Short-term and long-term selective intestinal decontamination with oral norfloxacin has proved highly effective in preventing bacterial infection and spontaneous bacterial peritonitis in bleeding cirrhotic patients as well as recurrence of spontaneous bacterial peritonitis.