Epidemiological analysis of Acinetobacter baumannii strains isolated from a surgical intensive care unit.

A serious epidemic of Acinetobacter baumannii resistant to imipenem occurred in the surgical intensive care unit of the hospital Charles-Nicolle in Tunis during February 1994, causing two deaths among three patients. The Acinetobacter strains were isolated from various samples of the intensive care unit. The techniques used for typing were biotyping, antibiogram, plasmid profiles and chromosomal DNA by random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD). The A baumannii strains isolated from patients exhibited an identical pattern with all the epidemiological markers utilized; the strains from the surrounding areas showed four and six different patterns respectively for phenotypic and genotypic characters. The strain isolated from a care table had the same phenotypic and genotypic pattern as that of the patients' strains.