Polystyrene Sulfonate Is a Safe and Effective Candidate Topical Antimicrobial for the Prevention of Sexually Transmitted Diseases

Abstract 951 Poster Session IV, Tuesday, 5/4 (poster 141)

Active ingredients in currently marketed vaginal contraceptive and antimicrobial formations are detergents which are spermicidal and microbicidal. However, detergents are cytotoxic in vitro and potentially toxic to the human genital tract. Novel agents with a different spectrum of antimicrobial activity are clearly needed to protect women and newborns from sexually transmitted diseases. One candidate compound is polystyrene sulfonate (PSS) which is being developed jointly by the Program for the Topical Development of Conception and Disease, Rush University, and Advanced Care Products as a novel non-spermicidal contraceptive. In this development, we evaluated the antimicrobial activity of PSS using model culture systems. We found that PSS is highly effective against all pathogens assayed as shown in the table (ED₅₀ is the dose of PSS needed to inhibit 50% of infection and is calculated from dose response curves).

Table 1 No caption

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