Comparison of Trimethoprim-Sulfamethoxazole with Ampicillin in Acute Infectious Exacerbations of Chronic Bronchitis: A Double-Blind Crossover Study

Two separate acute bacterial exacerbations of chronic bronchitis or chronic asthmatic bronchitis were treated in 20 patients in a double-blind crossover study. One course of treatment consisted of 320 mg of trimethoprim (TMP) plus 1,600 mg of sulfamethoxazole (SMZ) daily and the other of 2 g of ampicillin daily; each drug was given for 14 days. Patients were observed initially, twice a week during therapy, and weekly after therapy. Observations that were recorded included graded chest symptoms and physical findings, vital signs, pulmonary function, hematologic parameters, and objective sputum measurements (daily volume, purulence, differential quantitative cytology, quantitative bacterial counts, physical properties, levels of lactate dehydrogenase with its isoenzymes, levels of myeloperoxidase, and presence of deoxyribonucleic acid fibers). Both antibiotic regimens were effective in resolving these acute bacterial exacerbations. Paired z-test analysis revealed few and minor differences between TMP-SMZ and ampicillin during therapy, although three patients did not complete TMP-SMZ therapy because of adverse reactions. However, the period between the two bacterial exacerbations was significantly longer after ampicillin therapy. Innovative in this investigation are the study design and the objective quantitative measurements of inflammatory response and bacterial populations in sputu

Use of Transition Probabilities to Estimate the Effect of Smoking on the Duration of Episodes of Respiratory Symptoms in Diary Data: The Swiss Study on Air Pollution and Lung Diseases in Adults (SAPALDIA)

Incompletely documented symptom episodes pose methodological problems in the analysis of diary data. The aim of this study was to develop a method of estimating the average durations of symptomatic and nonsymptomatic episodes, respectively, coping with the problem of bias due to undocumented days and censored episodes that is found in most diary studies. The authors derived their outcome variables from a Markov model using transition probabilities. To evaluate this method, the authors assessed the impact of active smoking on the duration of episodes of bronchitis symptoms and the corresponding nonsymptomatic periods, respectively, using diary data (1992-1993) obtained from 801 participants in the Swiss Study on Air Pollution and Lung Diseases in Adults. Covariate-adjusted distribution curves for the mean durations of individual episodes were estimated by Cox regression. Median values for light smokers (<10 cigarettes/day) were 60.0 sympton-free days (95% confidence interval (CI) 42.0-78.5) and 4.0 symptomatic days (95% CI 3.0-6.0), respectively, compared with medians of only 21.0 days 95% CI 16.2-29.8) for periods without bronchitis symptoms and 6.0 days (95% CI 4.9-9.0) for episodes of bronchitis symptoms in heavy smokers(≥30 cigarettes/day). The authors suggest that the Markov method is a feasible approach to the assessment of long term effects of smoking and environmental risk factors on the average duration of symptomatic and nonsymptomatic respiratory episodes. Am J Epidemiol 1998;148:600-