Coque T M, Seetulsingh P, Singh K V, Murray B E
Center for the Study of Emerging and Re-Emerging Pathogens, Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Internal Medicine, Univeron, UK.
Methods Mol Med. 1998;15:469-93. doi: 10.1385/0-89603-498-4:469.
Enterococci are components of the normal bowel flora of humans and other animals, and have traditionally been considered to be of relatively low virulence in healthy individuals. However, they are increasingly important nosocomial pathogens and have been cited as the leading organism isolated from hospital-acquired infections, and the third leading cause of nosocomial bacteremia in the United States in a recent National Nosocomial Infection Surveillance (NNIS) system report of the Centers for Disease Control (1). The increase in enterococcal infections has been associated with the emergence of resistance to multiple antibiotics, in particular resistance to B-lactams, high-level aminoglycoside resistance, and resistance to glycopeptides. Concern that antibiotic resistance will continue to spread and will increasingly render conventional antimicrobial chemotherapy inadequate for serious enterococcal infections has stimulated interest in methods to improve the diagnosis and epi-demiologic investigation of infections caused by enterococci.
肠球菌是人类和其他动物正常肠道菌群的组成部分，传统上被认为在健康个体中致病性相对较低。然而，它们日益成为重要的医院感染病原体，在疾病控制中心最近的一份国家医院感染监测（NNIS）系统报告中，被列为从医院获得性感染中分离出的主要病原体，也是美国医院获得性菌血症的第三大主要病因（1）。肠球菌感染的增加与对多种抗生素耐药性的出现有关，特别是对β-内酰胺类抗生素的耐药性、高水平氨基糖苷类抗生素耐药性以及对糖肽类抗生素的耐药性。由于担心抗生素耐药性将继续传播，并将越来越使传统的抗菌化疗方法不足以治疗严重的肠球菌感染，人们对改进肠球菌感染的诊断和流行病学调查方法产生了兴趣。
