Oral vancomycin is used to treat which infection?

Oral vancomycin is used to treat which infection?

• A. C. difficile
• B. MRSA
• C. Pseudomonas
• D. Candida albicans

Answer: (A)

Oral vancomycin is effective in the gut because it is poorly absorbed systemically, so it stays in the intestinal lumen and reaches very high concentrations there. This makes it ideal for treating Clostridioides difficile infection, which causes antibiotic-associated colitis in the colon. IV vancomycin is used for systemic infections such as MRSA, but oral vancomycin wouldn’t reach the bloodstream to treat those; and vancomycin has no activity against fungi like Candida albicans or against most Gram-negative bacteria such as Pseudomonas. So the infection treated with oral vancomycin is C. difficile infection.

Oral vancomycin is effective in the gut because it is poorly absorbed systemically, so it stays in the intestinal lumen and reaches very high concentrations there. This makes it ideal for treating Clostridioides difficile infection, which causes antibiotic-associated colitis in the colon. IV vancomycin is used for systemic infections such as MRSA, but oral vancomycin wouldn’t reach the bloodstream to treat those; and vancomycin has no activity against fungi like Candida albicans or against most Gram-negative bacteria such as Pseudomonas. So the infection treated with oral vancomycin is C. difficile infection.