C. difficile in diabetic foot patients
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Carriage of toxigenic and non-toxigenic Clostridium difficile in patients with diabetic foot ulcers with and without antibiotics
IRAS ID
189205
Contact name
Surabhi Taori
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Kings College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 0 months, 1 days
Research summary
Diabetes is a multi-organ disease which often affects the lower limbs reducing the blood supply and sensation in the legs causing foot deformities leading to ulceration and infections which often need long treatment with broad spectrum antibiotics. These antibiotics disrupt the balance of healthy bacteria in the gut increasing susceptibility to infection with Clostridium difficile a bacterium which in its toxin producing variant causes symptoms which range from mild diarrhoea to more severe forms like gut perforation and even death.
However,unexpectedly a recent study (1) found that only 1/ 111 surveyed diabetics had toxin producing C. difficile raising the possibility that changes in gut microbes of diabetic patients may be different from other populations.
We hypothesize that the antibiotics used to treat diabetic foot patients may result in the overgrowth of C. difficile. It is possible that the non-toxigenic variety could provide a protective effect against the toxigenic variety whereas the toxigenic variety could predispose to development of clinical disease. For this we wish to look for toxin and non-toxin producing C.difficile in the stool samples of patients who have diabetes and study whether the amount and type of antibiotics given to these patients influences the carriage rates.The study will be carried out at King's College Hospital in one year.
REC name
London - Westminster Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
16/LO/1398
Date of REC Opinion
29 Jul 2016
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion