Antibiotics That Cause Stevens-Johnson Syndrome and Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis

Although Stevens-Johnson syndrome (SJS) and toxic epidermal necrolysis (TEN) are rare, full-time primary care clinicians or hospitalists occasionally will see patients with this dermatologic disorder. SJS/TEN is a particularly anxiety-provoking diagnosis because of the high associated morbidity and mortality and the absence of clearly effective systemic therapies. In addition, drugs that we prescribe commonly are often implicated as causes of SJS/TEN.

For this meta-analysis, researchers searched for published case series with at least 30 patients with SJS/TEN and focused on antibiotic culprit drugs. Thirty-eight studies — comprising 3000 patients from 5 continents — were identified. In 86% of cases, a drug was the presumed cause of SJS/TEN. …