Fig. 7.

COX-2 inhibition protects sensitized mice against recurrent acute and chronic cystitis. Convalescent mice previously sensitized by a history of chronic cystitis lasting 4 weeks prior to antibiotic treatment were orally gavaged with 10 mg/kg of either a COX-2 specific inhibitor, (SC-236) or a COX-1 specific inhibitor (SC-560), or vehicle alone (Mock) 30 min prior to challenge bladder infection with 10⁸ cfu of the UPEC strain UTI89. SC-560 treatments were repeated at 8 hpi, due to its short half-life. (A) Longitudinal urinalysis for bacterial enumeration was performed over 4 weeks of challenge infection. (B) Bladder titers were determined at 4 weeks post-challenge. (C) Urine bacterial titers and (D) the abundance of neutrophils in the urine sediment were quantitated at 24 h post-challenge. Red data points in panels A, C and D indicate urine parameters for mice that had bladder titers > 10⁴ cfu at sacrifice in panel B. In graphs, data points shown represent actual values for each individual mouse and data are combined from 3 independent experiments; bars indicate median values and dashed lines indicate the limit of detection; all statistics shown used the Mann–Whitney U two-tailed test; ns: not significant, * P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, ****P < 0.0001.