Abstract
Although phage therapy is still in the research and development stage, there are already a small number of cases where phages have been successfully used as an alternative treatment for multidrug-resistant infections. Given this, this Commentary discusses the potential contribution of phage therapy to combat urinary tract infections.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
References
Aragón IM, Herrera-Imbroda B, Queipo-Ortuño MI, Castillo E, Del Moral JS, Gómez-Millán J, Yucel G, Lara MF (2018) The urinary tract microbiome in health and disease. Eur Urol Focus 4:128–138
Balcázar JL (2018) How do bacteriophages promote antibiotic resistance in the environment? Clin Microbiol Infect 24:447–449
Bunduki GK, Heinz E, Phiri VS, Noah P, Feasey N, Musaya J (2021) Virulence factors and antimicrobial resistance of uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC) isolated from urinary tract infections: a systematic review and meta-analysis. BMC Infect Dis 21:753
Fauconnier A (2019) Phage therapy regulation: from night to dawn. Viruses 11:352
Garretto A, Miller-Ensminger T, Wolfe AJ, Putonti C (2019) Bacteriophages of the lower urinary tract. Nat Rev Urol 16:422–432
González-Villalobos E, Ribas-Aparicio RM, Montealegre G, Belmont-Monroy L, Ortega-García Y, Aparicio-Ozores G, Balcázar JL, Eslava-Campos CA, Hernández-Chiñas U, Molina-López J (2021) Isolation and characterization of novel bacteriophages as a potential therapeutic option for Escherichia coli urinary tract infections. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 105:5617–5629
Gu Y, Xu Y, Xu J, Yu X, Huang X, Liu G, Liu X (2019) Identification of novel bacteriophage vB_EcoP-EG1 with lytic activity against planktonic and biofilm forms of uropathogenic Escherichia coli. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 103:315–326
Miller-Ensminger T, Garretto A, Brenner J, Thomas-White K, Zambom A, Wolfe AJ, Putonti C (2018) Bacteriophages of the urinary microbiome. J Bacteriol 200:e00738-e817
Pirnay JP, Verbeken G, Ceyssens PJ, Huys I, De Vos D, Ameloot C, Fauconnier A (2018) The magistral phage. Viruses 10:64
Schmelcher M, Donovan DM, Loessner MJ (2012) Bacteriophage endolysins as novel antimicrobials. Future Microbiol 7:1147–1171
Shah C, Baral R, Bartaula B, Shrestha LB (2019) Virulence factors of uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC) and correlation with antimicrobial resistance. BMC Microbiol 19:204
Sharma K, Dhar N, Thacker VV, Simonet TM, Signorino-Gelo F, Knott GW, McKinney JD (2021) Dynamic persistence of UPEC intracellular bacterial communities in a human bladder-chip model of urinary tract infection. eLife 10:e66481
Ujmajuridze A, Chanishvili N, Goderdzishvili M, Leitner L, Mehnert U, Chkhotua A, Kessler TM, Sybesma W (2018) Adapted bacteriophages for treating urinary tract infections. Front Microbiol 9:1832
Wang IN, Smith DL, Young R (2000) Holins: the protein clocks of bacteriophage infections. Ann Rev Microbiol 54:799–825
Young I, Wang I, Roof WD (2000) Phages will out: strategies of host cell lysis. Trends Microbiol 8:120–128
Funding
This work was supported by a New Lecturer Research Grant from the Society for Applied Microbiology, and by the CERCA Program of the Catalan Government. EGV thanks the National Council for Science and Technology (CONACYT, Mexico) for the postdoctoral fellowship (CVU no. 441304).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors declare no competing interests.
Additional information
Publisher's note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
González-Villalobos, E., Molina-López, J. & Balcázar, J.L. Phage therapy for urinary tract infections: does it really work?. Int Microbiol 25, 665–667 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10123-022-00237-w
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10123-022-00237-w