Septic complications of endoscopic laser treatment of gastrointestinal diseases.

This study was designated to establish the incidence of septic complications associated with Nd:YAG-laser treatment of varied gastrointestinal lesions. A total of 30 laser procedures were performed for 27 patients with both upper and lower gastrointestinal diseases. Thirty minutes after the completion of laser therapy, blood culture was obtained from each patient. Only one patient developed sepsis with fever, chills and positive blood culture, the organism isolated was Streptococcus mitis. All the other patients tolerated the treatment well and without signs of septic complications. According to this study, antibiotic prophylaxis is not necessary for gastrointestinal laser treatment. However, the conclusions must be cautious due to the small number of patients included in this study.