Shahid Ahmad Abbasi, Karamat Ahmed Karamat, Aamer Ikram, Zia Ullah, Javaid Usman.
High level aminoglycoside resistance in enterococci.
Pak J Pathol Jan ;9(4):29-32.

Enterococci have a striking rate of relative and absolute resistance to the commonly used antibiotics against Gram positive bacteria. Apart from having intrinsic resistance to many antimicrobials, these bacteria show remarkable abilities of acquiring new resistance and transferring it to other bacteria of same and different species. Aminoglycosides are used in combination therapies with beta-lactams and glycopeptides for treating severe infections (endocarditis, meningitis) caused by enterococci. These drugs cannot be used in combination therapies against isolates showing high level resistance (HLAR). One hundred isolates of enterococci from hospitalized patients comprising of Enterococcus faecalis (n=92) and Enterococcus faecium (n=8) were included in our study. Sixty isolates were from faeces (colonizers) and 40 from various clinical specimen. The isolates were tested for the presence of HLAR against streptomycin and gentamicin. Agar dilution method was employed for the calculation of minimum inhibitory concentrations (MIC`s) of the isolates. Thirty two isolates (32%) having MIC`s > 2000ug/mI showed (HLAR against streptomycin) and 29 (29%) isolates having MIC`s>500Iug/ml had HLAR against gentamicin. In our setup HLAR against streptomycin and gentamicin (which denotes resistance against other aminoglycosides also) is quite prevalent and occurs at nearly the same percentage for both the drugs. Testing for HLAR against aminoglycosides is advocated before using these drugs in combination therapies for severe enterococcal infections.

PakMediNet -Pakistan's largest Database of Pakistani Medical Journals - http://www.pakmedinet.com