Publication:

To evaluate the creatinine clearance and compare nephrotoxic potential of amikacin and gentamicin, in post-operative patients with normal baseline renal function

Background The majority of infections on any surgical ward are usually due to one or more of the gram-negative bacilli. Among the different groups of antimicrobials that have been used to treat these infections, Aminoglycoside antibiotics such as Amikacin and Gentamicin are the most commonly used.

Methods The study is 1 year, non-interventional, prospective study of patients administered either Amikacin or Gentamicin following surgery carried out in surgery ward in co-ordination with department of Pharmacology, Teerthanker Mahaveer Medical College and Research Centre Moradabad.

Results The mean difference in final and initial serum creatinine values were observed to be 0.32 and 0.52 with a standard deviation of 0.228 and 0.387 in AM and GM group respectively. This difference was statistically significant with p value of 0.007. The mean difference in final and initial creatinine clearance values were observed to be 18.82 and 24.76 with a standard deviation of 10.14 and 11.93 in AM and GM group respectively. This difference was also statistically significant with p-value of 0.013. Nephrotoxicity occurred in 9 out of 50 patients (18%) in AM group out of which 12% were male and 6% were female whereas in case of GM group nephrotoxicity occurred in 16 out of 50 patients (32%) in which 26% were male and 6% were female.

Conclusions From this study we can conclude that Gentamicin is more nephrotoxic and causes greater fall in creatinine clearance although the dose of Gentamicin administered is much lower compared to Amikacin.