Background: Managing drug-food interactions may help to achieve the optimal action and safety profile of β-lactam antibiotics.

Methods: We conducted a systematic review with meta-analyses in adherence to PRISMA guidelines for 32 β-lactams. We included 166 studies assessing the impact of food, beverages, antacids or mineral supplements on the pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters or PK/pharmacodynamic (PK/PD) indices.

Results: Eighteen of 25 β-lactams for which data on food impact were available had clinically important interactions. We observed the highest negative influence of food (AUC or Cmax decreased by >40%) for ampicillin, cefaclor (immediate-release formulations), cefroxadine, cefradine, cloxacillin, oxacillin, penicillin V (liquid formulations and tablets) and sultamicillin, whereas the highest positive influence (AUC or Cmax increased by >45%) for cefditoren pivoxil, cefuroxime and tebipenem pivoxil (extended-release tablets). Significantly lower bioavailability in the presence of antacids or mineral supplements occurred for 4 of 13 analysed β-lactams, with the highest negative impact for cefdinir (with iron salts) and moderate for cefpodoxime proxetil (with antacids). Data on beverage impact were limited to 11 antibiotics. With milk, the extent of absorption was decreased by >40% for cefalexin, cefradine, penicillin G and penicillin V, whereas it was moderately increased for cefuroxime. No significant interaction occurred with cranberry juice for two tested drugs (amoxicillin and cefaclor).

Conclusions: Factors such as physicochemical features of antibiotics, drug formulation, type of intervention, and patient's health state may influence interactions. Due to the poor actuality and diverse methodology of included studies and unproportionate data availability for individual drugs, we judged the quality of evidence as low.