[Antibiotic prophylaxis in thoracic surgery, pulmonary endoscopy, thoracic injuries and lung transplantation].

Effectiveness of prophylactic antibiotics is at present time well documented for many surgical procedures. In lung surgery, numerous randomized double-blinded studies have demonstrated the effectiveness of 1st or 2nd generation cephalosporins, administered over a short period of time, not exceeding 24 h. In the opposite, thoracic injuries do not seem to require prophylactic antibiotics, except penetrating injuries of the chest, which could benefit from a single antibiotic injection. In case of lung transplantation, infectious complications result from many factors, among which immunosuppression plays an important role. A prolonged antibiotherapy is routinely used by many transplantation teams, despite the lack of studies proving the effectiveness of this practice.