1887

Abstract

Summary.

Of 3952 clinical isolates of Enterobacteriaceae, 246 exhibited resistance to at least carbenicillin, gentamicin and tobramycin. All these isolates, representing eight genera, were resistant to at least nine antimicrobial agents in common, including the three key antibiotics and streptomycin, kanamycin, sisomycin, ampicillin, cephalothin and sul-phonamide. The strains could be subdivided into seven groups depending upon additional resistance traits and some were resistant to as many as 15 antibiotics. When mated with a standard strain of , 85% of 123 randomly selected donors transferred resistance to at least the nine core antibiotics. Some donors occasionally transferred resistance to two additional antibiotics, neomycin and tetracycline, while one donor always transferred linked resistance to all 11 drugs. Although many donors were found to harbour more than one species of plasmid DNA, all except a strain of contained at least a plasmid of mol. wt 89 × 10. Analysis of transconjugants showed this plasmid to be responsible for transferable resistance to the nine core antibiotics. Restriction-endonuclease analysis indicates that the 89 × 10 plasmids originating from different isolates were essentially identical with each other. These results show that a particular R plasmid has established itself among the Enterobacteriaceae at Hines VA Hospital. This R plasmid appears to be the predominant genetic element responsible for linked resistance to carbenicillin, gentamicin and tobramycin among these hospital-associated bacteria.

Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journal/jmm/10.1099/00222615-14-4-371
1981-11-01
2024-03-29
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

/deliver/fulltext/jmm/14/4/medmicro-14-4-371.html?itemId=/content/journal/jmm/10.1099/00222615-14-4-371&mimeType=html&fmt=ahah

References

  1. Bauer A. W., Kirby W. M. M., Sherris J. C., Turck M. 1966; Antibiotic susceptibility testing by a standardized single disc method. Am. J. din. Path 45:493
    [Google Scholar]
  2. Casse F., Boucher C., Julliot J. S., Michel M., Dénarié J. 1979; Identification and characterization of large plasmids in Rhizobium meliloti using agarose gel electrophoresis. J. gen. Microbiol 113:229
    [Google Scholar]
  3. Curie K., Speller D. C. E., Simpson R. A., Stephens M., Cooke D. I. 1978; A hospital epidemic caused by a gentamicin-resistant Klebsiella aerogenes. J. Hyg., Camb 80:115
    [Google Scholar]
  4. Currier T. C., Nester E. W. 1976; Isolation of covalently closed circular DNA of high molecular weight from bacteria. Analyt. Biochem 76:431
    [Google Scholar]
  5. Datta N., Hughes V. M., Nugent M. E., Richards H. 1979; Plasmids and transposons and their stability and mutability in bacteria isolated during an outbreak of hospital infection. Plasmid 2:182
    [Google Scholar]
  6. Datta N., Dacey S., Hughes V., Knight S., Richards H., Williams G., Casewell M., Shannon K. P. 1980; Distribution of genes for trimethoprim and gentamicin resistance in bacteria and their plasmids in a general hospital. J. gen. Microbiol 118:495
    [Google Scholar]
  7. Elwell L. P., Inamine J. M., Minshew B. H. 1978; Common plasmid specifying tobramycin resistance found in two enteric bacteria isolated from burn patients. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother 13:312
    [Google Scholar]
  8. Falkow S. 1975 Infectious multiple drug resistance Pion; London:
    [Google Scholar]
  9. Farrand S. K., Kado C. I., Ireland C. R. 1981; Suppression of tumorigenicity by the Ine W R plasmid pSa in Agrobacterium tumefaciens. Molec. gen. Genet 181:44
    [Google Scholar]
  10. Farrar W. E. 1979; Antibiotic resistance in intestinal bacteria. Clin. Gastroenterol 8:803
    [Google Scholar]
  11. Gerding D. N., Buxton A. E., Hughes R. A., Cleary P. P., Arbaczawski J., Stamm W. E. 1979; Nosocomial multiply resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae: epidemiology of an outbreak of apparent index case origin. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother 15:608
    [Google Scholar]
  12. Hamada S. E., Luckey J. P., Farrand S. K. 1979; R-plasmid-mediated chromosomal gene transfer in Agrobacterium tumefaciens. J. Bact 139:280
    [Google Scholar]
  13. Ingram L. C., Richmond M. H., Sykes R. B. 1973; Molecular characterization of the R factors implicated in the carbenicillin resistance of a sequence of Pseudomonas aeruginosa strains isolated from burns. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother 3:279
    [Google Scholar]
  14. Jobanputra R. S., Datta N. 1974; Trimethoprim R factors in enterobacteria from clinical specimens. J. med. Microbiol 7:169
    [Google Scholar]
  15. Korfhagen T. R., Loper J. C., Ferrel J. A. 1975; Pseudomonas aeruginosa R factors determining gentamicin plus carbenicillin resistance from patients with urinary tract colonizations. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother 7:64
    [Google Scholar]
  16. Mawer S. L., Greenwood D. 1977; Aminoglycoside resistance emerging during therapy. Lancet 1:749
    [Google Scholar]
  17. Meyers J. A., Sanchez D., Elwell L. P., Falkow S. 1976; Simple agarose gel electrophoretic method for the identification and characterization of plasmid deoxyribo-nucleic acid. J. Bact 127:1529
    [Google Scholar]
  18. Olexy V., Bird T., Grieble H., Farrand S. 1978; Characterization of R factors from Serratia marcescens transferable to Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Abstr. ann. Mtg. Am. Soc. Microbiol 1:123
    [Google Scholar]
  19. Olexy V. M., Bird T. J., Grieble H. G., Farrand S. K. 1979; Hospital isolates of Serratia marcescens transferring ampicillin, carbenicillin, and gentamicin resistance to other gram-negative bacteria including Pseudonomas aeruginosa. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother 15:93
    [Google Scholar]
  20. Prasad T., Olexy V., Talanda-Fath C., Grieble H., Farrand S. 1978; Identity between R-factors coding for resistance to carbenicillin and gentamicin isolated from various species of Enterobacteriaceae. Abstr. ann. Mtg. Am. Soc. Microbiol 1:123
    [Google Scholar]
  21. Rennie R. P., Duncan I. B. R. 1977; Emergence of gentamicin-resistant Klebsiella in a general hospital. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother 11:179
    [Google Scholar]
  22. Richmond M. H. 1975; R factors in man and his environment. In Microbiology 1974 Schlessinger D. American Society for Microbiology; Washington DC:27–35
    [Google Scholar]
  23. Rubens C. E., McNeill W. F., Farrar W. E. 1979; Evolution of multiple-antibiotic-resistance plasmids mediated by transposable plasmid deoxyribonucleic acid sequences. J. Bact 140:713
    [Google Scholar]
  24. Sadowski P. L., Peterson B. C., Gerding D., Cleary P. P. 1978a; Use of a restriction endonuclease to establish the persistence and epidemic spread of a single R plasmid in the hospital environment. In Microbiology 1978 Schlessinger D. American Society for Microbiology; Washington DC:270–272
    [Google Scholar]
  25. Sadowski P. L., Peterson B. C., Gerding D. N., Cleary P. P. 1979; Physical characterization of ten R plasmids obtained from an outbreak of nosocomial Klebsiella pneumoniae infections. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother 15:616
    [Google Scholar]
  26. Talanda-Fath C. 1980; Characterization of a multiple antibiotic resistance plasmid from Proteus mirabilis. Master’s thesis, Stritch School of Medicine Loyola University of Chicago;
    [Google Scholar]
http://instance.metastore.ingenta.com/content/journal/jmm/10.1099/00222615-14-4-371
Loading
/content/journal/jmm/10.1099/00222615-14-4-371
Loading

Data & Media loading...

This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was a Success
Invalid data
An Error Occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error