Continuous intravenous vancomycin in children with normal renal function hospitalized in hematology-oncology: prospective validation of a dosing regimen optimizing steady-state concentration. 
Continuous intravenous (IV) infusion has been shown to be the best option to administer vancomycin because of its time-dependent bactericidal activity.  Available IV vancomycin dosing guidelines in pediatrics with normal renal function leads to less than 50% of patients achieving a vancomycin serum concentration (Css) in the target range (15-20 mg/L).  The primary objective of this study was to prospectively validate an age-based dosing regimen in pediatric oncology-hematology.  The secondary objective was to investigate the influence on Css attainment of different variables.  A continuous IV dosing nomogram was built by retrospective study (2000-2010) on Bayesian dosing adjustments performed in 161 patients.  This study assessed the prospective validation of this age-based nomogram and the influence on Css attainment of variables as the gender, underlying disease (oncology or hematology), and hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) before receiving vancomycin therapy.  A total of 94 patients aged from 4.3 months to 17.9 years old with normal renal function were eligible for the prospective validation.  Fifty-five of those patients (58.5%) achieved the target range of vancomycin Css.  There was no significant difference between age groups (P = 0.816) and no influence of gender (P = 0.500).  There was a nonsignificant trend to a better target attainment in oncology patients (69.2% vs. hematology 54.4%, P = 0.142) and patients who did not undergo HSCT (63.3% vs. 33.3%, P = 0.031).  This study proposed an age-based nomogram prospectively validated which near 60% of patients of each age class achieving the target range of Css.