Newest Approaches to Treatment of Pelvic Inflammatory Disease: A Review of Recent Randomized Clinical Trials

Treatment of pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) should provide high rates of clinical and microbiological cure for a range of pathogens and should ultimately prevent reproductive morbidity. Between 1992 and 2006, 5 randomized clinical trials of moxifloxacin (1 trial), ofloxacin (1 trial), clindamycin-ciprofloxacin (1 trial), and azithromycin (2 trials) treatment among women with mild to moderate PID were found to have clinical cure rates of 90%-97%. Trials of ofloxacin and clindamycin-ciprofloxacin reported rates of cure of Neisseria gonorrhoeae and Chlamydia trachomatis infection of 100%, although microbiological cure data for other pathogens were not presented. One azithromycin trial reported a 98% eradication of C. trachomatis, N. gonorrhoeae, Mycoplasma hominis, and anaerobes. Moxifloxacin exhibited high eradication rates for N. gonorrhoeae, C. trachomatis, M. hominis, Mycobacterium genitalium, and gram-negative anaerobes. Clinical cure rates from 2 doxycycline-metronidazole trials were low (35% and 55%). Although a handful of studies have shown that monotherapies for PID achieve high rates of clinical cure, the efficacy of these regimens in treating anaerobic PID and in preventing adverse reproductive sequelae is not fully elucidated.