Objective: Acute appendicitis is the most common acute surgical disease in childhood and it still presents frequent septic complications. This prospective and randomized study compares the efficacy of two cephalosporins (cefoxitin and ceftizoxime) in terms of clinical response, in vitro activity and characteristics of use in clinical practice.
Patients and methods: Of the 288 children with acute appendicitis admitted over a period of 15 months, 148 received cefoxitin (100 mg/kg/24 h; Group I) and 140 ceftizoxime (100 mg/kg/24 h; Group II) RESULTS: No significant differences were seen between these two groups in clinical response or infectious complication rates. In addition, activities of both antimicrobial agents against pathogens recovered from the peritoneal cultures of all patients were similar. The overall most common isolates were E. coli (75.5%), bacteroides species (33.7%) and Pseudomonas (32.4%).
Conclusions: We conclude that ceftizoxime is as effective as cefoxitin and can be surely employed in the treatment of acute appendicitis in children. Its addition, its longer half-life simplifies its use in clinical practice.