© 2000 Evidence-Based Nursing
Review: antibiotics have a slight beneficial effect on acute bronchitis
Bent S, Saint S, Vittinghoff E, et al.Antibiotics in acute bronchitis: a meta-analysis.Am J Med 1999 Jul;107:62–7[Medline]
QUESTION: In patients with acute bronchitis, do antibiotic drugs reduce sputum production, cough, or days off work?
English language studies were identified in Medline (1966 to April 1998) using the terms drug therapy, bronchitis, and acute disease; the reference lists of relevant articles were reviewed, and experts in the field were contacted.
Studies were selected if they were randomised controlled trials that compared antibiotics with placebo in patients who had acute bronchitis, but no history of chronic lung disease or pneumonia; treatment was given for 
5 days; and effect sizes could be calculated from the data presented.
Data were extracted on sample size, patient age, study inclusion and exclusion criteria, antibiotic regimen, and outcome measures. The main outcome measure was days of sputum production, which was transformed into units of standard deviation for each study.
8 studies (660 patients) were included, which used either erythromycin, doxycycline, or trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole. The overall summary effect size of antibiotic treatment was 0.21 units of standard deviation (95% CI 0.05 to 0.36),
Professor Clemson University School of Nursing Clemson, South Carolina, USA
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Drugs: infectious diseases
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TB and other respiratory infections
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Pneumonia (infectious disease)
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