The Efficacy of doxycycline as a single-session oral medication in the treatment of uncomplicated gonorrhea.

Review of the medical literature on the treatment of gonorrhea indicates penicillin G may have reached its peak of effectiveness due to the relative high resistance of the gonococci to it. Doxycycline had been investigated in this study to ascertain if it is at least as effective as penicillin G and to ascertain if its side effects proscribe its use. A randomized prospective study was conducted on 237 subjects identified as having a positive culture for N. Gonorrhea and were assigned to one of two regime; Doxycycline 600 mg orally in a divided dose one hour apart and aqueous procaine penicillin G 4.8 million unites intramuscularly with one gram of probenecid orally. There were no treatment failures in 141 subjects treated with penicillin G and no reported side effects except the localized pain of injection. There were two treatment failures in 96 subjects treated with Doxycycline and two reported cases with side effects, on with nausea and one with diarrhea (X2=3.08m p>0.05). The minimum inhibitory concentrations of penicillin G and Doxycycline for the gonococenl isolates indicated no reduction in resistance to penicillin, G, but a reduction in resistance to the tetracyclines. This study concludes that doxycycline is as effective as penicillin G in the treatment of gonorrhea. While the side effects of the antibiotics may have been under-reported, these were not enough to proscribe the use of doxycycline. Finally, the decreased resistance of the gonococci to the tetracyclines indicates it may be the preferred treatment for gonorrhea instead of penicillin G.