Filgrastim and Antibiotics Treatment Reduces Neutropenia Severity in Solid Cancer Patients

Introduction: Neutropenia has a detrimental effect on cancer patients’ quality of life, also possibly resultingin a reduction in the chemotherapy dose which could lead to an increment in the size of a cancer. The maindanger associated with neutropenia is the risk of bacterial, fungal or viral infection which may lead to patientdeath. Treatment including granulocyte-colony stimulating factors (G-CSF, filgrastim) so as to increase thebody immunity is given to neutropenic patients with no infection i.e., absence of fever. However, when infectionis present, antibiotics such as ceftazidime, imipenem and vancomycin need to be used.
Objective: The aim ofthis study was to find the association between neutropenia severity and treatment with filgrastim (Neupogen®)alone or in combination with antibiotics in solid cancer patients.
Methods: This is an observational retrospectivestudy on 117 cases suffering from neutropenia after chemotherapy administration. The patients were admittedto a government hospital for cancer treatment between the years 2003-2006. The types of data collected werecategorical and not normally distributed, covering demography, chemotherapy, severity of neutropenia (classifiedon absolute neutrophil count into mild, moderate and severe) and treatment of neutropenia, either filgrastim(Neupogen®) alone or in combination with antibiotics. Statistical tests used were the Chi-square test, Fisher’sexact test and logistic regression.
Results: The majority (69.2%) of the patients were treated with filgrastim (81)alone, only 30.8% receiving the combination. Significant associations between both treatments and neutropeniaseverity. Both Chi-square and Fisher’s exact tests showed P= 0.00. Logistic regression showed that filgrastim isthe major treatment for severe neutropenic patients since the result showed an infinity (E) and P= 0.00 forfilgrastim alone more than its combination with antibiotic.
Conclusion: The use of filgrastim is highly associatedwith treatment of severe neutropenia in solid cancer patients who received chemotherapy. So filgrastim isconsidered as the drug of choice in the presence of severe neutropenic case.