Comparison of the efficacy of gentamicin for 5 days plus doxycycline for 8 weeks versus streptomycin for 2 weeks plus doxycycline for 45 days in the treatment of human brucellosis: a randomized clinical trial

Results: The clinical manifestations in these two groups were similar. Therapeutic failure was seen in two (2.4%) patients in the gentamicin/doxycycline group and in four (4.9%) patients in the streptomycin/ doxycycline group [relative risk (RR) ¼0.5, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.09‐2.66, P ¼0.68]. Relapse was seen in two (2.4%) cases in the gentamicin/doxycycline group and in five (6.1%) cases in the streptomycin/ doxycycline group (RR¼0.4, 95% CI 0.08‐2, P ¼0.44). The efficacy with the gentamicin/doxycycline regimen was 95.12% and that with the streptomycin/doxycycline regimen was 89% (RR ¼1.07, 95% CI 0.98‐1.17, P ¼0.25). Cox regression analyses showed no differences among the two treatment groups for patients who had relapse or therapeutic failure and those who had not regarding baseline covariates such as sex, duration of disease before diagnosis, positive blood culture and focal disease. Conclusions: The results show that the efficacy of gentamicin for 5 days plus doxycycline for 8 weeks is not superior to that of streptomycin for 2 weeks plus doxycycline for 45 days.