Value of antibiotic levels in serum and cardiac vegetations for predicting antibacterial effect of ceftriaxone in experimental Escherichia coli endocarditis.

In a rabbit model of Escherichia coli endocarditis, we studied the penetration into infected vegetations and the antibacterial effect of ceftriaxone. Ceftriaxone was given at different dosages, alone or with an interfering agent, diclofenac, a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug, to determine the predictive value of the antibiotic levels in serum or infected vegetations on the antibacterial efficacy. Diclofenac increased the serum terminal half-life of ceftriaxone and increased its extravascular diffusion in tissue cage fluid, as well as in infected vegetations, allowing us to obtain various antibiotic concentrations in the infected site. Two hours after the fourth injection, around the time of peak level in serum, we observed a linear relationship between (i) serum and local antibiotic levels in vegetations, (ii) local antibiotic levels in a range of 142 to 600 X MBC and bacterial titer (log10 CFU/g) in vegetations, and (iii) serum antibiotic levels in a range of 800 to 1,400X MBC and bacterial titer in vegetations. In vivo, antibacterial effect was obtained only with high antibiotic levels in vegetations (greater than or equal to 220X MBC). This was confirmed by incubating vegetations sampled from infected animals in rabbit serum containing ceftriaxone (ex vivo experiment). Given once daily at a therapeutic dosage (30 mg/kg) for 4 days, ceftriaxone exhibited good efficacy (log10 CFU/g of vegetation = 2.41 +/- 2.7 versus 7.41 +/- 0.92 in control animals) and prevented regrowth of bacteria until 24 h after the last injection. We concluded that (i) provided the dose is sufficient, a long-acting cephalosporin can prove effective in severe gram-negative infections even when given infrequently, and (ii) serum antibiotic levels around the peak value, reflecting high effective local levels, could predict the therapeutic efficacy and represent a simple test to monitor the clinical course of a severe infectious process.