Cefepime Pharmacology

Real Life Pharmacology - Pharmacology Education for Health Care Professionals

Eric Christianson, PharmD; Pharmacology Expert and Clinical Pharmacist

Education, Health & Fitness, Medicine

5 • 716 Ratings

🗓️ 9 October 2025

⏱️ 12 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Cefepime is a fourth-generation cephalosporin antibiotic with broad-spectrum activity against both gram-positive and gram-negative organisms, including Pseudomonas aeruginosa. It works by inhibiting bacterial cell wall synthesis through binding to penicillin-binding proteins, leading to cell lysis and death.

Clinically, cefepime is commonly used in hospital settings for serious infections such as pneumonia, febrile neutropenia, urinary tract infections, skin infections, and intra-abdominal infections. It’s typically administered intravenously, with doses often ranging from 1 to 2 grams every 8 to 12 hours depending on the indication and renal function.

From a pharmacokinetic standpoint, cefepime is primarily renally eliminated, so dose adjustments are required in patients with impaired kidney function. Failure to reduce the dose appropriately can lead to neurotoxicity — one of the key adverse effects associated with cefepime — manifesting as encephalopathy, confusion, myoclonus, or seizures, particularly in elderly or renally impaired patients.

Common side effects include gastrointestinal upset and rash. Cefepime has relatively limited drug interactions, though concurrent nephrotoxic agents can increase the risk of renal injury.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hey all, welcome back to the Real Life Pharmacology podcast. I'm your host pharmacist, Eric Christensen.
0:05.4	Thank you so much for listening today. As always, go take a look at real life pharmacology.com.
0:12.5	We've got a free 31 page PDF on the top 200 drugs. It's a great study guide, great refresher.
0:19.7	I threw a lot of things on there that are actually happening in real-life practice,
0:25.0	as well as those things that frequently show up on pharmacology exams and board exams throughout your career.
0:32.4	So that 31-page PDF, absolutely free to use, simply an email.
0:36.7	We'll get you access to that, and we'll get you updates when we've got other content
0:41.2	available as well.
0:43.1	So go check that out at real-life pharmacology.com.
0:46.7	All right, getting into the medication of the day today, this drug is cephalopim.
0:54.1	This is a fourth generation cephalosporin. this drug is cephypim.
0:58.3	This is a fourth generation cephalosporin.
1:03.5	You could also classify it as a beta-lactam-type antibiotic.
1:10.5	Mechanistically, this medication, like many other cephalosporin antibiotics,
1:17.3	inhibits bacterial cell wall synthesis by binding to penicillin binding proteins.
1:32.5	Now, what's interesting about cephalopim and why it's considered a further down-the-line generation cephalosporin, is it tends to be more resistant to beta actamases compared to some of the earlier generations. So, you know, comparing it to a medication
1:42.2	like seftriaxone, which is frequently utilized in a hospital-type
1:48.1	setting.
1:50.7	Cepapapim helps avoid being broken down better by beta lactamases that are produced by bacteria,
1:58.8	so they can help us potentially treat infections
2:02.2	that maybe are resistant to some of those earlier generation cephalosporins.
2:09.2	Talking about coverage for cephalopim, it is a broad spectrum antibiotic and can cover
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Eric Christianson, PharmD; Pharmacology Expert and Clinical Pharmacist, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Eric Christianson, PharmD; Pharmacology Expert and Clinical Pharmacist and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.