The Use of Oral Steroids in the Treatment of Cellulitis

Penn State Health

Status and phase: Withdrawn; Phase 2

Conditions: Cellulitis; Erysipelas

Treatments: Drug: Placebo Oral Tablet; Drug: Prednisone

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT00893048

8876

Details and patient eligibility

About

The prevalence of cellulitis in society is very high, as much as 3% of visits to Emergency Departments are for the treatment of this disease. The treatment of cellulitis varies depending on the severity. Low severity cases are treated with pain control and antibiotics by mouth and high severity are treated with antibiotics intravenously and pain control. The investigator's hypothesis is to see if the addition of steroids, which are known to decrease inflammation, will decrease the length of the disease process. If so, it will decrease the length of stay if IV antibiotics are needed, it will decrease duration of days out of work and decrease the overall pain control required and therefore patient satisfaction.

Full description

The incidence of cellulitis is about 24.6 cases per 1000 person-years, which is an estimate, since cellulitis is not a reportable disease. In some Emergency Departments up to 3% of visits are for cellulitis. Depending on the severity of the disease, some are treated as outpatients, and others are admitted for IV antibiotics. In some Emergency Departments cases of cellulitis are treated in an observation area for 23 hours with doses of IV antibiotics. My proposed research is to see if the addition of one dose of prednisone the treatment will decrease the inflammatory reaction enough to decrease length of stay and treatment and increase patient satisfaction.

Sex: All

Ages: 18 to 70 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• 18-70 years old
• signs/symptoms of cellulitis

Exclusion criteria

• steroid use in last 2 weeks
• hx of adrenal insufficiency
• suspicion for dvt or abcess
• systemic signs of sepsis
• ICU admission

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Double Blind

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0 participants in 2 patient groups

Prednisone

Experimental group

Description:

Use of prednisone to decrease LOS and overall treatment time of cellulitis

Treatment:

Drug: Prednisone

Placebo

Experimental group

Treatment:

Drug: Placebo Oral Tablet