Clinical pharmacology and lesion penetrating properties of second- and third-line antituberculous agents used in the management of multidrug-resistant (MDR) and extensively-drug resistant (XDR) tuberculosis.

ABSTRACT: Failure of first-line chemotherapy to cure tuberculosis (TB) patients occurs, in part, because of the development of resistance to isoniazid (INH) and rifampicin (RIF) the two most sterilizing agents in the four-drug regimen used to treat primary infections. Strains resistant to both INH and RIF are termed multidrug-resistant (MDR). Treatment options for MDR patients involve a complex array of twenty different drugs only two classes of which are considered to be highly effective (fluoroquinolones and aminoglycosides). Resistance to these two classes results in strains known as extensively drug-resistant (XDR) and these types of infections are becoming increasingly common. Many of the remaining agents have poorly defined pharmacology but nonetheless are widely used in the treatment of this

SUBMITTER: Dartois V 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6344931 | biostudies-literature | 2010 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature