"Targeted" prophylaxis: Impact of rectal swab culture-directed prophylaxis on infectious complications after transrectal ultrasound-guided prostate biopsy

To assess the prevalence of fluoroquinolone resistance among patients undergoing transrectal ultrasound (TRUS)-guided prostate biopsy and the impact of rectal swab culture-directed antibiotic prophylaxis on postbiopsy infectious complications.

We prospectively analyzed all patients undergoing TRUS-guided prostate biopsy from April 2013 to February 2015. Antibiotic prophylaxis was tailored to the results of rectal swab cultures. If the organism was fluoroquinolone-sensitive, oral ciprofloxacin 500 mg with tinidazole 600 mg was prescribed. If the organism was fluoroquinolone-resistant, then a culture-directed antibiotic was prescribed. In both cases the antibiotic was continued for 3 days. All patients were followed for 14 days after biopsy to record infectious complications.

A total of 247 patients were included, and Escherichia coli was isolated on rectal swab cultures in 99.5% of the patients. Of these, 41.7% harbored fluoroquinolone-resistant E. coli. Piperacillin/tazobactam was the most common culture-directed antibiotic prescribed (59.3%), with amoxicillin/clavulanic being the second most common (25.5%) for the fluoroquinolone-resistant group. Only 2 patients (0.9%) developed postbiopsy fever and none had sepsis.

Colonization of rectal flora with fluoroquinolone-resistant E. coli was seen in 40% of men undergoing prostate biopsy. Targeted prophylaxis, which uses the results of prebiopsy rectal swab culture to direct antibiotic prophylaxis, results in low rates of postbiopsy infections.

Investigative and clinical urology. 2017 Aug 08 [Epub]

Prabhjot Singh, Ashish Kumar, Siddharth Yadav, Lok Prakash, Brusabhanu Nayak, Rajeev Kumar, Arti Kapil, Prem Nath Dogra

Department of Urology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India., Department of Microbiology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India.