Antimicrobial Resistance in and Resistance Genes in Coliphages from a Small Animal Clinic and in a Patient Dog with Chronic Urinary Tract Infection.

Antimicrobial resistance is on the rise in certain pathogens that infect pets and their owners. This has raised concerns about the use of antibiotics and the transfer of resistance elements in small animal clinics. We sampled a surgery unit, diagnostic rooms after disinfection, and a dog with chronic urinary tract infection (UTI), in a small animal clinic in Austria, and isolated/characterized phages and () for antimicrobial resistance, resistance genes and transduction ability. Neither the coliphages nor were isolated in the 20 samples of the surgery units and diagnostic rooms. From the urinary tract of the dog, we recovered 57 isolates and 60 coliphages. All of the isolates were determined as resistant against nalidixic acid, 47 against ampicillin, 34 against sulfonamides, and 33 against streptomycin. No isolate held resistance against tetracycline, trimethoprim, kanamycin, or chloramphenicol. Among the 60 phages, 29 tested positive for one or more resistance gene(s) by PCR, but none was able to transduce it to a laboratory strain or to an isolated from samples. Nevertheless, six phages out of 60 were able to transduce ampicillin resistance ( gene) after being grown on a harboring strain.