The bioavailability of mupirocin in nasal secretions in vitro.

AIM To determine the bioavailability of mupirocin in human nasal secretions and to assess whether the contents of nasal secretions interact appreciably with this antibiotic. METHODS The comparative bioavailability of mupirocin and chlorhexidine in nasal secretions was determined by bioassay after one, four, and eight hours of incubation with pooled secretions from three subjects. The interaction of mupirocin with nasal secretions was characterised by matrix assisted laser desorption time of flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF). RESULTS MALDI-TOF analysis showed that mupirocin was not absorbed by the main fraction of pooled nasal secretions and should remain active. In bioassay, mupirocin retained 100% of its antistaphylococcal activity in nasal secretions, whereas chlorhexidine was significantly reduced from 100 mg/litre to 1.5 mg/litre and from 1000 mg/litre to 38.5 mg/litre, irrespective of incubation time. CONCLUSIONS The high bioavailability of mupirocin in nasal secretions results from the lack of appreciable molecular interactions.