| Abstract
| - A total of 127 patients (57 given placebo and 70 given a singlepreoperative dose of 1 g cefazolin) undergoing thoracic surgery wereincluded in a randomized double-blind trial. The two groups were similar inregard to mean age, sex ratio, in-hospital stay before surgery, underlyingdisease, risk factors, type of surgery, mean duration of surgicalprocedure, and mean duration of chest tube drainage. The relative risk ofwound infection of the patients from the placebo group was 3.27 (range1.5-11.5; 95% confidence interval). Cefazolin significantly reduced (p lessthan 0.01) the wound infection rate--1 case (1.5%) in the cefazolin groupversus 8 cases (14%) in the placebo group--but not the incidence ofpostoperative pleural empyema-- 5 (7%) versus 8 cases (14%)--or nosocomialpneumonia--3 (4%) versus 5 cases (9%). Cultures were made from 3 out of 9wound infections and Staphylococcus aureus or S. epidermidis was isolatedin all 3. In addition, cultures were made from 6 out of 13 pleural cavityinfections and S. aureus (1 case) or other microorganisms (5 cases) wereisolated in all 6. Mortality was similar in both groups and all deathsunrelated to the infections. No adverse side effects of the drug wereencountered. In conclusion, a single preoperative dose of 1 g cefazolinproved to be effective for reducing the wound infection rate in non-cardiac thoracic surgery.
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