Antibiotic Treatment for the Sexual Partners of Women with Bacterial Vaginosis

Summary

A Cochrane review [Abstract] 1 included 7 studies with a total of 1026 subjects. Five trials (854 patients) compared any antibiotic treatment of sexual partners with placebo. Based on high quality evidence, antibiotic treatment does not increase the rate of clinical or symptomatic improvement in women with bacterial vaginosis during the first week (RR 0.99, 95% CI 0.96 to 1.03; 4 trials, n=712; RR 1.06, 95% CI 1.00 to 1.12; 3 trials, n=577, respectively), between the first and fourth week, or after the fourth week (RR 0.98, 95% CI 0.90 to 1.07; 4 trials, n=572; RR 1.03, 95% CI 0.90 to 1.17; 2 trials, n=296, respectively). Antibiotic treatment does not led to a lower recurrence during the first and fourth week (RR 1.28, 95% CI 0.68 to 2.43; one trial, n=218) or after the fourth week of treatment (RR 1.00, 95% CI 0.67 to 1.52; 3 trials, n=372 participants) in women, but increases the frequency of adverse events (most frequently gastrointestinal symptoms) reported by sexual partners (RR 2.55, 95% CI 1.55 to 4.18; 3 trials, n=477).

A multicenter,double-blind, placebo-controlled study 2 included 214 couples. Male partners of women with recurrent BV and current diagnosis of BV were randomized to placebo versus multidose metronidazole for 7 days. There was no significant difference between treatment arms for BV recurrence in women.