The activity of piperacillin/tazobactam against clinical isolates collected in 20 UK centres and the design of a disc test for susceptibility testing.

The in-vitro activities of piperacillin plus tazobactam at ratios of 4:1, 8:1 and 16:1 were determined against 952 non-copy clinical aerobic bacterial isolates collected from 20 UK centres. Tazobactam enhanced the activity of piperacillin against Enterobacteriaceae, Staphylococcus aureus, Haemophilus influenzae and Moraxella catarrhalis. No enhancement was noted for Pseudomonas aeruginosa, other Pseudomonas spp., streptococci and enterococci. For 95.6% of strains MICs were either the same or only one two-fold dilution different with all the three ratios of tazobactam, and for most of the remaining strains the piperacillin MIC was lowest with the highest proportion of the tazobactam (4:1). The percentage of strains which remained resistant was also lowest with the 4:1 ratio. Regression analysis of MICs versus inhibition zone size with a variety of disc strengths tested on DST agar indicated that for Enterobacteriaceae, and H. influenzae 30 +4 micrograms, and 5 +1 microgram piperacillin/tazobactam discs gave the most reliable results. However, for S. aureus no disc gave good discrimination. Zone sizes obtained on DST and Iso-Sensitest agar were similar, with 96.1% of 1450 paired tests showing agreement to within 3 mm.