The benefits of drug monitoring in patients with bacterial meningitis, eg, chloramphenicol monitoring.

Regular drug monitoring during therapy with chloramphenicol sodium succinate is actually recommended by expert centers. In this report a case of meningitis due to Salmonella typhimurium is described, which underlines the necessity of examining both the chloramphenicol and the chloramphenicol succinate concentrations. It is suggested that medical microbiologists and clinicians should be encouraged to take advantage of new, quick, and sensitive methods for drug monitoring in order to achieve optimal therapy.