[12] These include folliculitis, carbuncles,[13] impetigo, ecthyma, cellulitis, erysipelas, necrotising fasciitis, and infections of skin conditions such as eczema, scabies, ulcers and acne.

[5] However, support for this practice has lessened since findings in a study published in the Emergency Medicine Journal in 2005 did not show this combination to give additional clinical benefit.

[6] Despite having a lower than optimum drug penetration into bone ratio of 10–20%, flucloxacillin appears effective in treating osteomyelitis.

[6] Despite flucloxacillin being insensitive to beta-lactamases, some organisms have developed resistance to it and other narrow-spectrum β-lactam antibiotics including methicillin.

Such organisms include methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, which has developed resistance to flucloxacillin and other penicillins by having an altered penicillin-binding protein.

The estimated incidence is one in 15,000 exposures, and is more frequent in people over the age of 55, females, and those with a treatment duration of longer than two weeks.

It inhibits cross-linkage between the linear peptidoglycan polymer chains that make up a major component of the cell wall of Gram-positive bacteria.

[citation needed] Flucloxacillin has similar pharmacokinetics, antibacterial activity, and indications to dicloxacillin, and the two agents are considered interchangeable.

[citation needed] Flucloxacillin was developed in the 1960s following an increase in penicillin-resistant (beta-lactamase producing) staphylococcal infections due to the widespread use of benzylpenicillin by 1960.

By 1962, a series of similarly structured acid-stable penicillins (oxacillin, cloxacillin, dicloxacillin and flucloxacillin), with the potential for being taken by mouth, were developed.

[29][30] Beecham further developed cloxacillin and popularised flucloxacillin in the UK, while Bristol Laboratories concentrated on marketing oxacillin and dicloxacillin in the United States, leading to the difference in use in both countries.

[8] In several other countries however, it is supplied under a variety of trade names including Floxapen, Flopen, Flubex, Flupen, Phylopen, and Staphylex.