Carbapenemase Production and Detection of Colistin-Resistant Genes in Clinical Isolates of from the Ho Teaching Hospital, Ghana.

BACKGROUND

Effective and successful treatment of infectious diseases is a significant gain in clinical settings. However, resistance to antibiotics, especially the last-resort medicines, including carbapenems and colistin is on the rise.

AIM

The aim of this study was to detect carbapenemase production and colistin-resistant genes in clinical isolates of . The study was a cross-sectional study carried out from July 2018 to June 2019. One hundred and thirty-five nonrepetitive isolates obtained from various clinical samples were screened for carbapenemase production using meropenem (10 g) and imipenem (10 g) disks. Screened-positive isolates were further subjected to a confirmatory test using modified carbapenem inhibition method (mCIM). Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) was extracted from all the isolates to detect colistin-resistant genes by polymerase chain reaction. Data were analyzed using GraphPad Prism version 8.00 for Windows and IBM SPSS version 26 (IMB Corp. New York, USA).

RESULTS

Of the 135 isolates, 2 were screened positive for carbapenemase production but tested negative to mCIM. With the colistin-resistant genes, only and 2_700bp were detected in 3 of the isolates, representing 2.2%. The was detected in a high vaginal swab sample of a female aged between 65 and 84 years. 2_700bp was also detected in urine and blood samples of the patients.

CONCLUSION

The study investigated the presence of carbapenemase and colistin-resistant genes in organisms. The absence of carbapenemase in the isolates and the detection of colistin-genes call for strict infection prevention and control practices to prevent their introduction and spread to other bacterial species, respectively.