TY - JOUR
T1 - Invasive candidiasis in the neutropenic cancer patient
AU - Gamaletsou, Maria N.
AU - Sipsas, Nikolaos V.
AU - Kontoyiannis, Dimitrios P.
N1 - Funding Information:
Acknowledgments NVS acknowledges financial support from the Special Account for Research Funds (ELKE) of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece.
PY - 2011/3
Y1 - 2011/3
N2 - Invasive candidiasis (IC) is an important complication among cancer patients with neutropenia, as it is associated with significant mortality. Despite the introduction of the new antifungals in clinical practice and their widespread use as treatment or prophylaxis, the incidence of IC and the predominance of non-albicans Candida species remain unchanged, and mortality rates remain as high as in previous periods. New techniques have been developed to decrease the time to Candida species identification from blood cultures. Nonculture diagnostic methods and molecular diagnostic tests for detection of Candida are promising but have not been validated in neutropenic patients. Recently, voriconazole was proved to be as effective as fluconazole for prophylaxis in neutropenic recipients of hematopoietic stem cell transplants and in patients with graft-versus-host disease. Despite the lack of randomized studies of the treatment of IC among neutropenic patients, it seems that the success rates of antifungal therapy do not differ from those in non-neutropenic patients.
AB - Invasive candidiasis (IC) is an important complication among cancer patients with neutropenia, as it is associated with significant mortality. Despite the introduction of the new antifungals in clinical practice and their widespread use as treatment or prophylaxis, the incidence of IC and the predominance of non-albicans Candida species remain unchanged, and mortality rates remain as high as in previous periods. New techniques have been developed to decrease the time to Candida species identification from blood cultures. Nonculture diagnostic methods and molecular diagnostic tests for detection of Candida are promising but have not been validated in neutropenic patients. Recently, voriconazole was proved to be as effective as fluconazole for prophylaxis in neutropenic recipients of hematopoietic stem cell transplants and in patients with graft-versus-host disease. Despite the lack of randomized studies of the treatment of IC among neutropenic patients, it seems that the success rates of antifungal therapy do not differ from those in non-neutropenic patients.
KW - Antifungal prophylaxis
KW - Antifungal treatment
KW - Cancer
KW - Epidemiology
KW - Invasive candidiasis
KW - Neutropenia
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U2 - 10.1007/s12281-010-0044-4
DO - 10.1007/s12281-010-0044-4
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:79952185902
SN - 1936-3761
VL - 5
SP - 34
EP - 41
JO - Current Fungal Infection Reports
JF - Current Fungal Infection Reports
IS - 1
ER -