Trial reportEBioMedicine2018
Short- and long-term impacts of azithromycin treatment on the gut microbiota in children: A double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial.
Trial report in EBioMedicine, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 59 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
59 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 116 citations in OpenAlex.
- The effect of antibiotics on the intestinal microbiota in children - a systematic review.Frontiers in allergy · 2024Pooled it
- Impact of antibiotics on gut microbiome composition and resistome in the first years of life in low- to middle-income countries: A systematic review.PLoS medicine · 2023Pooled it
- Systematic review: microbial manipulation as therapy for primary sclerosing cholangitis.Alimentary pharmacology & therapeutics · 2023Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Effect of one prophylactic dose of azithromycin on Bifidobacterium infantis colonization in infants from the Mumta trial.International journal of infectious diseases : IJID : official publication of the International Society for Infectious Diseases · 2025Trial
- Biannual Administrations of Azithromycin and the Gastrointestinal Microbiome of Malawian Children: A Nested Cohort Study Within a Randomized Controlled Trial.Frontiers in public health · 2022Trial
- Intestinal microbiome analysis demonstrates azithromycin post-treatment effects improve when combined with lactulose.World journal of pediatrics : WJP · 2020Trial
- Dietary and nutritional strategies for reducing disease risk associated with antibiotic-induced dysbiosis.Gut microbes · 2026Review
- Impact of co-amoxiclav-induced gut microbiota modulation on seizure frequency in children with drug-resistant epilepsy.Iranian journal of microbiology · 2026Article
- Interplay between viral infections and gut microbiota dysbiosis: Mechanisms and therapeutic potential.World journal of gastroenterology · 2026Review
- Mechanisms, Efficacy, Safety, and Pharmacoeconomics of Low-Dose, Long-Term Macrolide Antibiotics in the Treatment of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease: A Review.International journal of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease · 2026Review
- Pharmacomicrobiomics.Clinical pharmacology and therapeutics · 2025Review
- The microbiome and gut-lung axis in nontuberculous mycobacterial pulmonary disease.PLoS pathogens · 2025Review
- Whose burden, whose benefit? Revisiting ethical trade-offs in the WHO guidelines on scaling up mass azithromycin administration.PLoS medicine · 2025Article
- Evaluating Effects of Antibiotics Across Preclinical Models of the Human Gastrointestinal Microbiota.MicrobiologyOpen · 2025Article
- The Global Challenge of Antimicrobial Resistance: Mechanisms, Case Studies, and Mitigation Approaches.Health science reports · 2025Article
- Risk factors and outcomes of Clostridioides difficile infection in patients with colorectal cancer: critical perspective in management.Gut pathogens · 2025Review
- Use of gastrointestinal syndromic multiplex molecular assays and detection ofJournal of clinical microbiology · 2025Article
- Review
- Assessing the potential for non-digestible carbohydrates toward mitigating adverse effects of antibiotics on microbiota composition and activity in an in vitro colon model of the weaning infant.FEMS microbiology ecology · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
9 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundMacrolides are commonly prescribed for respiratory infections and asthma-like episodes in children. While their clinical benefits have been proved, concerns regarding the side-effects of their therapeutic use have been raised. Here we assess the short- and long-term impacts of azithromycin on the gut microbiota of young children.
methodsWe performed a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial in a group of children aged 12-36 months, diagnosed with recurrent asthma-like symptoms from the COPSAC
findingsShort-term, azithromycin caused a 23% reduction in observed richness and 13% reduction in Shannon diversity. Microbiota composition was shifted primarily in the Actinobacteria phylum, especially a reduction of abundance in the genus Bifidobacterium. Long-term (13-39 months after treatment), we did not observe any differences between the azithromycin and placebo recipients in their gut microbiota composition.
interpretationAzithromycin treatment induced a perturbation in the gut microbiota 14 days after randomization but did not have long-lasting effects on the gut microbiota composition. However, it should be noted that our analyses included a limited number of fecal samples for the placebo treated group at age 4 years. FUND: Lundbeck Foundation, Danish Ministry of Health, Danish Council for Strategic Research, Capital Region Research Foundation, China Scholarship Council.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.