Long-term antibiotic therapy in patients with surgery-indicated not undergoing surgery infective endocarditis

Edocarditis infecciosa; Tractament antibiòtic supressiu; Cirurgia Endocarditis infecciosa; Tratamiento antibiótico supresor: Cirugía Infective endocarditis; Suppressive antibiotic treatment; Surgery Background: To date, there is little information regarding management of patients with infective endocarditis (IE) that did not undergo an indicated surgery. Therefore, we aimed to evaluate prognosis of these patients treated with a long-term antibiotic treatment strategy, including oral long term suppressive antibiotic treatment in five referral centres with a multidisciplinary endocarditis team. Methods: This retrospective, multicenter study retrieved individual patient-level data from five referral centres in Spain. Among a total of 1797, 32 consecutive patients with IE were examined (median age 72 years; 78% males) who had not undergone an indicated surgery, but received long-term antibiotic treatment (LTAT) and were followed by a multidisciplinary endocarditis team, between 2011 and 2019. Primary outcomes were infection relapse and mortality during follow-up. Results: Among 32 patients, 21 had IE associated with prostheses. Of the latter, 8 had an ascending aorta prosthetic graft. In 24 patients, a switch to long-term oral suppressive antibiotic treatment (LOSAT) was considered. The median duration of LOSAT was 277 days. Four patients experienced a relapse during follow-up. One patient died within 60 days, and 12 patients died between 60 days and 3 years. However, only 4 deaths were related to IE. Conclusions: The present study results suggest that a LTAT strategy, including LOSAT, might be considered for patients with IE that cannot undergo an indicated surgery. After hospitalization, they should be followed by a multidisciplinary endocarditis team. Antoni Bayes-Genis was supported by grants from the Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia (SAF2014–59892), Fundació La MARATÓ de TV3 (201502, 201516), CIBER Cardiovascular (CB16/11/00403), and AdvanceCat 2014. María Hernández Pérez is supported by a Juan Rodes research contract (JR17/00006) from Instituto de Salud Carlos III.