TABLE 11.

Evidence of the role of short-term antibacterial treatment in ReA

Reference	Study design	No. of patients and diagnosis	Intervention	Results
55	Open, randomized, prospective	40 entero-ReA (Yersinia, Salmonella, Campylobacter)	No treatment versus antibacterial agents (pivampicilin, pivmecillinam, doxycycline, erythromycin, co-trimoxazole, cinxacin)	No difference in duration of arthritis, grade of inflammation, number of joints involved, laboratory tests
123	Open	108 enterocolitis	65 treated with antibacterials (9 days) (ciprofloxacin, norfloxacin, doxycycline, co-trimoxazole, pivmecillinam- pivampicillin)	No effects of antibiotics on prevention of development of arthritis
11	Retrospective	224 episodes of genitourinary tract infections (60 ReA patients with urogenital infections)	59 episodes, no treatment; 97 episodes, penicillin treatment; 68 episodes, erythromycin or tetracyclin therapy for at least 1 day	37% of those not treated or treated with penicillin developed ReA, compared with 10% of those treated with erythromycin or tetracycline