Donor stool best for recurrent C difficile

Infections

1 Sep 2016

Faecal transplantation with donor stool is more effective than a patient’s own stool in preventing further Clostridium difficile episodes in people with recurrent infection, a new study shows.

The randomised trial published in the Annals of Internal Medicine involved 46 adults with three or more recurrences of C difficile infection who had been treated with a full course of vancomycin for their most recent acute episode. Each patient was  randomly assigned to transplantation with stool from a donor or transplantation with their own stool.

Results showed that 90.9% (20 of 22 patients) transplanted with donor stool achieved clinical cure of diarrhoea with no further need for antibiotics, compared with 62.5% (15 of 24) transplanted with their own stool (P=0.042). 

Nine of the patients treated with their own stool and developed recurrent C difficile infection had no further recurrences after subsequent faecal transplantation with donor stool.

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