Background: The antibiotic colistin is effective against many Gram-negative bacilli (GNB). For decades, it was almost no longer used in human medicine, but it was used in veterinary medicine. Due to the increasing resistance of GNB to antibiotics, it is again interesting for the treatment of patients, though data of colistin-resistant isolates (ColR) are scarce.
The purpose of the thesis was to assess the extent of the ColR problem, to determine the proportion of ColR GNB colonisied patients in intensive care units (ICU), to evaluate the usefulness of methods for the rapid determination of ColR isolates, and to obtain in-depth information about ColR isolates in the central Slovenian region.
Methods: The minimal inhibitory concentration for colistin for 1176 prospectively collected GNB isolates was determined. Control samples from ICU patients were processed using two protocols. The results of three methods for rapid determination of ColR were compared with the results of the reference method. The whole genome of 21 colR Escherichia coli isolates was sequenced and analyzed.
Results: Colistin resistance rates were 3.4%, 6.3%, 24.7%, 5.1%, 11.7% and 23.7% among E. coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Enterobacter spp., Citrobacter spp., Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Acinetobacter baumannii isolates, respectively. A two-step epidemiologocial screening with specificity of 99.5% and sensitivity of 87.5% was introduced. 9.4% of ICU patientes were colonised with ColR isolates. Rapid Polymyxin NP (Enterobacterales) and Rapid ResaPolymyxin NP (A. baumannii) proved to be the most suitable tests for the rapid determination of ColR. A single mcr-1 gene was found in an E. coli isolate, in other isolates chromosomal adaptation were found.
Conclusions: ColR rates among GNB isolates were higher than expected. Based on our findings, protocol with pre-enrichment step is mandatory to identify ColR carriers. Two methods for rapid detection of ColR isolates were promising, but the final result must be confirmed with the reference method. Sequencing of ColR E. coli isolates revealed sporadic cases of ColR isolates with complex resistance mechanisms.
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