New CDC Report on Gonorrhea Treatment

Providers are Treating Gonorrhea as CDC Recommends 

for Majority of Patients

Gonorrhea control in the U.S. largely relies 

on effective antibiotic therapy.

A recent CDC MMWR report shows that providers treated 81% of patients diagnosed with gonorrhea using CDC’s recommended dual therapy. While encouraging, nearly 1 in 5 patients were treated with a different regimen, signifying room for improvement.

Antibiotic resistance is making gonorrhea much harder to treat. Recommended treatment involves a combination of two drugs, an injection of ceftriaxone and an oral dose of azithromycin, to potentially slow the emergence and spread of drug resistance.

The report, titled Adherence to CDC Recommendations for the Treatment of Uncomplicated Gonorrhea, STD Surveillance Network (SSuN), 2016, found that a majority of cases treated with other regimens were treated with monotherapy. This could accelerate antibiotic resistance and increase the possibility that the patient may not be cured of the infection.

Take Action

• Local and state health departments: monitor adherence to recommendations in your jurisdiction, and continue working with providers and patients to assure timely detection and treatment of gonorrhea according to current CDC treatment recommendations.
• Healthcare providers: always follow CDC screening and treatment guidelines, report treatment failures to your health department’s STD program, and prevent reinfection by notifying and treating partners.

CDC works to strengthen the ability to detect and respond to drug-resistant gonorrhea with comprehensive support nationwide. Learn more about these efforts to combat the threat of antibiotic resistance.

Slowing the threat of #DrugResistant #gonorrhea hinges on providers following #CDC treatment recommendations. Here’s how they’re doing: https://go.usa.gov/xQQ2T @CDCMMWR