Alternative treatments for Clostridium difficile disease: what really works?

University of Washington, HSR&D, 1100 Olive Street, #1400, Seattle, WA 98101, USA Correspondence Lynne V. McFarland lvmcfarl{at}u.washington.edu Vancomycin and metronidazole have been used for treating Clostridium difficile- associated disease (CDAD) for the past 25 years, but approximately 20 % of patients develop recurrent disease. The increasing incidence of nosocomial outbreaks, cases of recurrent CDAD and other complications (toxic megacolon, ileus, sepsis) has fuelled the search for different types of treatments. As the understanding of the pathogenesis of this disease has matured, newer treatment strategies that take advantage of these mechanisms have been developed. This review will describe such treatments and examine the evidence for each strategy. This paper was presented at the First International Clostridium difficile Symposium, Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, 5–7 May 2004.