RENAL CHANGES IN A CASE OF SULFADIAZINE ANURIA

Abstract

Early in the treatment of pneumonia with sulfapyridine and sulfathiazole, attention was drawn to the side effects of those drugs on the kidney. Complications involving the urinary tract have been caused by obstruction of the ureters, kidney pelves, calices and tubules by crystals of the acetylated form of the drug and secondly by toxic effects of the drugs on the kidney tissue. Changes noted in renal tissues were cloudy swelling and desquamation in the tubules. Such changes were noted by Smith and Delaney,¹who have recently reported 5 cases of pneumonia in which renal complications developed following treatment with sulfapyridine and sulfathiazole. Two patients failed to survive and came to postmortem examination. In the first instance sulfapyridine was administered. Pathologic examination of the kidneys showed definite degenerative changes confined largely to the convoluted tubules. The second patient suffered from chronic glomerulonephritis, contracted pneumonia and was treated with sulfathiazole. Postmortem