Adverse events in people taking macrolide antibiotics | 食品添加物合法業者資訊網

Review question

We wanted to find out if people treated with a macrolide antibiotic experienced more adverse events than those treated with placebo.

Background

Macrolide antibiotics are a group of antibiotics that are commonly used to treat both acute and chronic infections. The four most frequently used macrolides are: azithromycin, clarithromycin, erythromycin, and roxithromycin. People taking macrolide antibiotics are at risk of experiencing adverse events such as nausea, diarrhoea, or rash.

Search date

We searched the literature up to May 2018.

Study characteristics

We included 183 studies with a total of 252,886 participants. Most studies were conducted in the hospital setting. Azithromycin and erythromycin were more commonly studied than clarithromycin and roxithromycin. Most studies (89%) reported some adver...