The recommended antibiotic treatment duration for Enterobacteriaceae bloodstream infections is 7 days to 14 days. For the study, researchers assessed the health outcomes of 770 patients treated for the infection at one of three medical centers from 2008 through 2014. Half of the patients received six days to 10 days of antibiotics, and the other half received 11 days to 16 days of antibiotics.
Researchers identified no difference in mortality between the two treatment groups. The rates of recurrent bloodstream infections between the two groups were also comparable.
However, researchers did observe a trend suggesting short-course antibiotic treatment may help protect against infections from multidrug-resistant gram-negative bacteria, though the trend was not statistically significant.
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