Fever and Neutropenia — How to Use a New Treatment Strategy

The treatment of fever and neutropenia has evolved with the development of both new antimicrobial drugs and new strategies for using them. More than three decades ago, Bodey and colleagues identified the association between neutropenia and serious infection in patients with cancer as such patients began to be treated with intensive cytotoxic chemotherapy and given platelet transfusions to prevent death from bleeding.1 The first effective treatment for patients with fever and neutropenia was the combination of an antipseudomonal penicillin, carbenicillin, and gentamicin in a strategy of early empirical therapy triggered by fever alone.2 The studies of Pizzo and colleagues refined . . .