engleski

Antifungal resistance patterns among oral Candida species from patients receiving head and neck radiotherapy

Objectives: Patients receiving radiotherapy treatment for head and neck cancer are highly susceptible to oral candidiasis. This infection is a common source of discomfort and a potential source of systemic infection. This study was conducted to understand the current status of resistance to antifungal agents among patients hospitalized in Clinical hospital Rijeka. Methods: Oral swabs were collected from 32 hospitalized patients receiving head and neck radiotherapy treatmen for malignant disease. Yeasts isolates were tested for their susceptibilities to two antifungal agents (amphotericin B and fluconazole) by using commercially available Etest (AB Biodisk, Solna, Sweden). Results: At the time of sampling, 14 (43, 75%) patients were found to be colonized with yeasts. All the isolates were Candida albicans. Antifungal susceptibility patterns showed that 100% of isolates were susceptible to amphotericin B (mean MIC- 0, 1045 microg/ml), while 92, 8% were susceptible to fluconazole (mean MIC- 0, 11 microg/ml). Conclusion: The frequence of resistant Candida is low in patients with cancer receiving head and neck raditherapy treatment. However, it is important to continouslly determine the distribution and susceptibility patterns of yeasts which should assist in developing optimal prophylactic strategies that can reduce clinically detectable oral candidiasis in this group of patients.

Candida species; radiotherapy; head and neck

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