Topical antibiotics shorten the duration of conjunctival symptoms

Topical antibiotics are associated with a shorter duration of conjunctivitis symptoms in children with acute infectious conjunctivitis, according to a study published online Oct. 4. JAMA Open Network.

Minna Honkila, MD, of Oulu University Hospital in Finland, and colleagues conducted a randomized trial Art primary care in Finland involving children with acute infectious conjunctivitis to study the effectiveness of topical antibiotic therapy. Eighty-eight children were enrolled and were randomly assigned to receive moxifloxacin eye drops, placebo eye drops, or no intervention (30, 27, and 31 children, respectively). In addition, a meta-analysis was performed that included the current study and three previous randomized trials clinical trials a total of 584 children (300 randomly assigned to topical antibiotics and 284 to placebo).

The researchers found that compared with the no-intervention group, the time to clinical cure was significantly shorter in the maxifloxacin group (3.8 vs. 5.7 days); relative to no intervention, both moxifloxacin and placebo eye drops significantly reduced the time to clinical treatment in the survival analysis. In the village meta-analysisobserved a reduction in the proportion of children with symptoms of conjunctivitis on days 3-6 associated with the use of topical antibiotics compared with placebo (odds ratio 0.59).

“The current study, which was designed to address current inconsistencies, found that topical antibiotics are effective in the treatment of acute infectious conjunctivitis in children,” the authors write.

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