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. 1987 May 1;136(9):935–938.

The effect of cephalothin prophylaxis on postoperative ventriculoperitoneal shunt infections.

M J Rieder, T C Frewen, R F Del Maestro, A Coyle, S Lovell
PMCID: PMC1491956  PMID: 3552176

Abstract

Postoperative infection is an important complication after insertion of a ventriculoperitoneal (VP) shunt in children with hydrocephalus. A randomized double-blind placebo-controlled study was performed to determine the efficacy of cephalothin in preventing postoperative shunt infection. Sixty-three children who presented for elective VP shunt insertion between January 1982 and December 1985 and who did not have a history of shunt infections were randomly assigned to receive four doses of prophylactic cephalothin, 25 mg/kg (32 patients), or of a multivitamin placebo (31 patients). Postoperative infection developed in 6% of the treatment group, compared with 10% of the placebo group, a difference that was not statistically significant, although a clinical significance may have been masked by the small sample size. A large multicentre trial is needed to determine the efficacy of antibiotic prophylaxis in reducing the incidence of postoperative VP shunt infections.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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