Protamine protects against vancomycin-induced kidney injury.

Vancomycin causes kidney injury by accumulating in the proximal tubule, likely mediated by megalin uptake. Protamine is a putative megalin inhibitor that shares binding sites with heparin and is approved for the treatment of heparin overdose. We employed a well-characterized Sprague-Dawley rat model to assess kidney injury and function in animals that received vancomycin, protamine alone, or vancomycin plus protamine over 5 days.

Refined methodology for quantifying virulence using .

Larvae of (the greater wax moth) are being increasingly used as a model to study microbial pathogenesis. In this model, bacterial virulence is typically measured by determining the 50% lethal dose (LD) of a bacterial strain or mutant. The use of to study pathogenesis, however, is challenging because of the extreme sensitivity of larvae to this bacterium.

Past, present, and future biomarkers of kidney function and injury: The relationship with antibiotics.

Routinely used kidney biomarkers of injury and function such as serum creatinine and urine albumin to creatinine ratio, are neither sensitive nor specific. Future biomarkers are being developed for clinical use and have already been included in guidance from groups such as the U.S.

Meta-analysis on safety of standard vs. prolonged infusion of beta-lactams.

Background: Efficacy for prolonged infusion beta-lactam dosing schemes has been previously described, but there has been less focus on the safety of standard vs. prolonged infusion protocols of beta-lactams. This study explored differences in adverse drug reactions (ADRs) reported for beta-lactams between each of these infusion protocols.