The effect of corticosteroids on serum fungistatic activity

The direct impairment of a serum fungistatic factor has been postulated as a mechanism to account for the greater severity of cutaneous fungal disease in patients treated with corticosteroids.Trichophyton mentagrophytes andTrichophyton rubrum were grown on Mycosel® agar containing increasing concentrations of normal human sera and sera from patients with Cushing's syndrome and from those receiving high doses of prednisone. Fungistatic activity, observed as a retardation of the normal growth pattern, was not significantly different in any of the sera tested.