Long-term antibiotic prophylaxis regimen compared to short-term antibiotic prophylaxis regimen in patients undergoing orthognathic surgery.

INTRODUCTION: Orthognathic surgery, being an invasive surgical procedure, may present significant postoperative morbidities for the patient. Among the most frequently described complications is surgical site infection. The administration of prophylactic antibiotics prior to this type of procedure is a common practice, however, the cost-benefit of the use of antibiotics, the type of antibiotics, the route of administration, the dosage, and the regimen to be used have not been clearly defined and are still considered a controversial issue. In this summary of evidence, we will compare long-term antibiotic prophylaxis with short-term prophylaxis.

METHODS: We searched in Epistemonikos, the largest database of systematic reviews in health, which is maintained by screening multiple information sources, including MEDLINE, EMBASE, Cochrane, among others. We extracted data from the systematic reviews, reanalyzed data of primary studies, conducted a meta-analysis and generated a summary of findings table using the GRADE approach.

RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: We identified five systematic reviews including nine studies overall, of which all nine were randomized trials. We conclude that administering a long-term prophylactic antibiotic regimen probably decreases the risk of surgical site infection and that it may increase the risk of hospital stay longer than two days, nevertheless, regarding this last point, the certainty of the evidence is low.