Intravenous Gentamicin Therapy for Infections in Patients with Cancer

Gentamicin sulfate was administered intravenously to 60 patients during 75 epi-sodes of infection. A dose of 30 mg of gentamicin/rn' ' was given every 6 hr, after an initial dose of 40 mg/rn-. Forty-one of the infections (55%) responded favorably. Only 32 % of the infections in patients with an initial neutrophil count of less than 100/mm3 responded favorably, as compared to 60 % of the in-fections in patients with an initial neutrophil count of more than 1,000/mm3. Azotemia occurred in 21 of the 57 patients who had normal initial levels of blood urea nitrogen and who received gentamicin for at least seven days. Gentamicin appears to be an effective antibiotic in cancer patients unless they have severe neutropenia. The drug can be administered safely by the intravenous route. Since effective therapy is now available for some malignant diseases, successful management of in-fections in patients with cancer has become increasingly important. Although the cancer pa-tient is susceptible to a wide variety of organisms