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A San Francisco sexual well being clinic considerably decreased charges of bacterial sexually transmitted
infections (STIs) amongst sufferers by preemptively prescribing the antibiotic doxycycline to be used
after unprotected intercourse (DoxyPEP).

The study, which appeared within the August version of the journal Sexually Transmitted Infections, targeted on sufferers who take pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), a medicine that protects HIV-negative individuals from contracting the virus. 

People who take PrEP are typically at better danger of contracting bacterial STIs, and researchers discovered that, amongst these sufferers, DoxyPEP (post-exposure prophylaxis) decreased the speed of recent infections by 58%.

While randomized medical trials of DoxyPEP have produced comparable outcomes, this research was among the many first to check the intervention in a real-world setting.

Big success lowering syphilis, chlamydia, however not gonorrhea

All PrEP shoppers on the San Francisco AIDS Foundation Sexual Health Clinic have quarterly HIV and bacterial STI screening. As a part of that routine care, the clinic started providing DoxyPEP to anybody who takes PrEP in November 2022. DoxyPEP is prescribed to be used inside 72 hours of unprotected intercourse.

Among the 1,209 PrEP sufferers who opted to take DoxyPEP, there was a 78% discount of syphilis circumstances and a 67% discount in chlamydia.

Interestingly, the research discovered no vital decline in gonorrhea. Researchers theorize that
is perhaps as a result of the prophylactic window for this bacterial an infection is smaller, with sufferers
needing to take doxycycline in lower than 24 hours after condomless intercourse. Other research have steered rising ranges of tetracycline-resistant gonorrhea might restrict its effectiveness.

The research acknowledges that for the reason that evaluation was carried out at a single clinic its outcomes “may have
limited generalisability to other non-sexual health-focused clinics or in different geographic
regions.”

Also, researchers didn’t measure antimicrobial resistance, a rising public well being concern in
which overuse of antibiotics threatens the effectiveness of those drugs.