Molecular Characteristics of Methicillin-Resistant and Susceptible from Pediatric Patients in Eastern China.

is an opportunistic pathogen that causes invasive infections in humans. In recent years, increasing studies have focused on the prevalence of infections in adults; however, the epidemiology and molecular characteristics of from Chinese pediatric patients remain unknown. The present study examined the population structure, antimicrobial resistance, and virulent factors of methicillin-resistant and -susceptible isolated from Chinese pediatric patients from one medical center in eastern China. A total of 81 cases were screened with positive infections among 864 pediatric patients between 2016 and 2022 in eastern China. Molecular analysis showed that ST22 (28.4%) and ST59 (13.6%) were the most typical strains, and associations between different clonal complex (CC) types/serotype types (ST) and the age of pediatric patients were observed in this study. CC398 was the predominant type in neonates under 1 month of age, while CC22 was mainly found in term-infant (under 1 year of age) and toddlers (over 1 year of age). Additionally, 17 isolates were resistant to at least three antimicrobials and majority of them belonged to CC59. The gene was found in 59 isolates and gene was present in 26 strains identified as methicillin-resistant. Numerous virulent factors were detected in isolated from present pediatric patients. Remarkably, F-PV and S-PV were dominantly carried by CC22, -1 genes were detected in CC188, CC7, and CC15, while exfoliative toxin genes were found only in CC121. Only 41.98% of the isolates possessed gene, indicating that the sources of infections in pediatric patients may include both human-to-human transmissions as well as environmental and nosocomial infections. Together, the present study provided a phylogenetic and genotypic comparison of from Chinese pediatric patients in Suzhou city. Our results suggested that the colonization of multi-drug resistant isolates of may raise concern among pediatric patients, at least from the present medical center in eastern China.