Therapeutic Options for the Treatment of Tinea Capitis Caused by <i>Trichophyton</i> Species: Griseofulvin Versus the New Oral Antifungal Agents, Terbinafine, Itraconazole, and Fluconazole
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Tinea capitis is a relatively common fungal infection of childhood. Griseofulvin has been the mainstay of management. However, newer oral antifungal agents are being used more frequently. A multicenter, prospective, randomized, single-blinded, non-industry-sponsored study was conducted in centers in Canada and South Africa to determine the relative efficacy and safety of griseofulvin, terbinafine, itraconazole, and fluconazole in the treatment of tinea capitis caused by Trichophyton species. The regimens for treating tinea capitis were griseofulvin microsize 20 mg/kg/day x 6 weeks, terbinafine [> 40 kg, one 250 mg tablet; 20-40 kg, 125 mg (half of a 250 mg tablet); < 20 kg, 62.5 mg (one-quarter of a 250 mg tablet)] x 2-3 weeks, itraconazole 5 mg/kg/day x 2-3 weeks, and fluconazole 6 mg/kg/day x 2-3 weeks. Patients were asked to return at weeks 4, 8, and 12 from the start of the study. Griseofulvin was administered for 6 weeks and the final evaluation was at week 12. Terbinafine, itraconazole, and fluconazole were administered for 2 weeks and the patient evaluated 4 weeks from the start of therapy. At this time, if clinically indicated, one extra week of therapy was given. There were 200 patients randomized to four treatment groups (50 in each group). At the final evaluation at week 12, the number of evaluable patients were griseofulvin, 46; terbinafine, 48; itraconazole, 46; and fluconazole, 46. Patients who discontinued therapy or were lost to follow-up were griseofulvin, 1/3; itraconazole, 0/4; terbinafine, 0/4; and fluconazole, 0/4. The causative organisms were Trichophyton tonsurans and T. violaceum species. Patients were regarded as effectively treated at week 12 if there was mycologic cure and either clinical cure or only a few residual symptoms. Effective treatment was recorded in, intention to treat, griseofulvin (46 of 50, 92.0%), terbinafine (47 of 50, 94.0%), itraconazole (43 of 50, 86.0%), and fluconazole (42 of 50, 84.0%) (p=0.33). Adverse effects were reported only in the griseofulvin group (gastrointestinal effects in six patients). Discontinuation from therapy due to adverse effects occurred only in the griseofulvin group (nausea in one patient). For the treatment of tinea capitis caused by the Trichophyton species, in this study, griseofulvin given for 6 weeks is similar in efficacy to terbinafine, itraconazole, and fluconazole given for 2-3 weeks. Each of the agents has a favorable adverse-effects profile.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.004 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".