The use of metronidazole in women undergoing obstetric anal sphincter injuries: a systematic review of the literature.

The electronic database search yielded a total of 54,356 results (Fig. 1). After duplicate exclusion 28,154 references remained. Of them, 26 were relevant to the review based on title and abstract screening. None of these articles dealt with the use of metronidazole for the prevention of infections complicating anal sphincter repair in women with OASIS. A Cochrane review addressing antibiotic prophylaxis for patients following OASIS, compared prophylactic antibiotics against placebo or no antibiotics, included only one randomized controlled trial of 147 participants. This study showed that prophylactic antibiotics (not metronidazole) may be helpful to prevent perineal wound complications following OASIS. Fig. 1 Study seection process CONCLUSION: Anaerobic infections potentially complicate wound repair after OASIS. Although scientific societies recommend the use of antibiotics for the prevention of infectious morbidity after OASIS, no study has specifically assessed the role of metronidazole.