Table 1.
A summary of clinical and safety trials of phage therapy. Yes: ✓; no: ✗; unclear: ?. * The phage titre used was 6 × 105 PFU/mL. Only one paper commented that there were likely insufficient bacteria to enable phage replication.
| Trial | Were the Phages Administered | Efficacy? | |||||
|
The right phage(s)? Was in vitro efficacy demonstrated before treatment? |
To the site of infection? Did the phages come into contact with the target bacteria? Could some bacteria have been inaccessible to phages? |
At the right time during the infection? I.e., could the infection have resolved before phage therapy could work or was the contact time between bacteria and phage sufficient for phage replication? |
In sufficient quantity? Was a significant number of phages (>106 PFU/mL) administered and/or available at the infection site? |
To sufficient bacteria? Was the bacterial population sufficient to enable substantial phage replication? |
|||
|
Historical trials
(pre-2000) |
Bryant et al. (1965), [38] | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ | ? | - | ✗ |
| Wittig et al. (1966), [36] | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ | - | ✗ | |
| Marcuk et al. (1971), [37] | ? | ✓ | ✗ | ? | - | ✗ | |
|
Modern trials
(post-2000) |
Rhoads et al. (2009), [21] | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | - | ✗ |
| Wright et al. (2009), [19] | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓* | - | ✓ | |
| Rose et al. (2014), [24] | ✗ | ✓ | ✗ | ✓ | - | ✗ | |
| Sarker et al. (2016), [25] | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ | |
| Jault et al. (2019), [28] | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ | ✗ | - | ✗ | |
| Ooi et al. (2019), [29] | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | - | ✓ | |
| Leitner et al. (2021), [30] | ✓ | ? | ✓ | ✗ | - | ✗ | |