Meta-analysis of flucytosine or fluconazole plus amphotericin B for the treatment of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome-associated cryptococcal meningitis / 中华传染病杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To evaluate the survival benefit of amphotericin B (AmB) plus flucytosine or fluconazole for treatment of patients with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS)-associated cryptococcal meningitis.Methods The following database were searched from the beginning to October 2013,including Cochrane library,PubMed,OVID,Embase,Wanfang Date,CNKI and Chinese Biomedical Database,and the references of eligible studies were manually screened.Reference lists of relevant articles were screened according to selection and extraction criteria.Meta-analysis was performed using RevMan 5.2.Results Four prospective controlled studies with a total of 399 patients with cryptococcal meningitis were identified,including 386 patients with AIDS-associated cryptococcal meningitis and 13 human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-negative patients.Two hundred and twentyseven patients were treated with AmB and flucytosine combination therapy,including 217 patients with AIDS-associated cryptococcal meningitis and 10 HIV-negative patients.One hundred and seventy-two patients were treated with AmB and fluconazole combination therapy,including 169 patients with AIDS-associated cryptococcal meningitis and 3 HIV-negative patients.The Meta-analysis revealed that the mortality rate in AmB plus flucytosine combination therapy group was 6.6％ (95％ CI:18.5％-31.6 ％) at two weeks point,which was significantly lower than that in AmB plus fluconazole combination group (19.7％,95％CI:-23.6％-62.9％; OR=0.51,95％CI:0.27-0.93,P＜0.05).But at 10 weeks point,the mortality rate in flucytosine combination group was 12.9％ (95％oo CI:-22.2％-48.0％),which was lower than that in fluconazole combination group (31.4％,95％ CI:-23.1％-85.9 ％).However,there was no statistically significant difference between these two groups at 10 weeks point (OR=0.70,95％CI:0.44-1.13,P=0.15).Conclusion Administration of AmB plus flucytosine at early stage can reduce the mortality rate in patients with AIDS-associated cryptococcal meningitis.