Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome in the Burn Patient

Abstract

There is an urgent unmet medical need for new antibiotics for wound and burn infections caused by multidrug-resistant (MDR) Gram-negative ‘superbugs’ Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Acinetobacter baumannii and Klebsiella pneumoniae. The authors discuss the development of novel broad-spectrum lipopeptides that are very active against not only polymyxin-resistant Gram-negative pathogens but also MDR Gram-positive Staphylococcus aureus and Enterococcus faecium that also commonly cause serious wound infections. The authors describe MDR bacterial wound infections, mechanisms of polymyxin activity and resistance and the discovery of new polymyxin-like lipopeptides targeting MDR ‘superbugs’. These next-generation polymyxins hold significant potential for the treatment of chronic wound infections caused by problematic Gram-negative ‘superbugs’.