Double-blind comparison of weekend and daily regimens of oral acyclovir for suppression of recurrent genital herpes

Abstract

The potential utility of intermittent regimens of oral acyclovir for suppression of recurrent genital herpes depends on how long the suppressive effect of the drug persists during pauses in treatment. To study this question, we admitted 38 patients in a double-blind controlled trial comparing the results of daily acyclovir treatment (200 mg t.i.d.) with treatment on weekend days only (400 mg t.i.d. on Saturday and Sunday) for suppression of recurrent genital herpes. Of the 35 patients completing the study, significantly more failures occurred in the weekend group (13/17) than in the daily group (3/18, P less than 0.001). Failures on the weekend regimen were more frequent as the week progressed (P = 0.005). The findings suggest a short-term persistence of suppression by acyclovir and hence that intermittent regimens with more closely spaced periods of treatment may be more effective than the regimen we studied. Most virus isolates studied, including all of those isolated from the patients during treatment, were sensitive to acyclovir.