RT Journal Article SR Electronic(1) A1 Chew, Ka Lip A1 Cheng, Janet W. S. A1 Hudaa Osman, Nurul A1 Lin, Raymond T. P. A1 Teo, Jeanette W. P.YR 2017 T1 Predominance of clarithromycin-susceptible Mycobacterium massiliense subspecies: Characterization of the Mycobacterium abscessus complex at a tertiary acute care hospital JF Journal of Medical Microbiology, VO 66 IS 10 SP 1443 OP 1447 DO https://doi.org/10.1099/jmm.0.000576 PB Microbiology Society, SN 1473-5644, AB To characterize members of the Mycobacterium abscessus complex, with an emphasis on the correlation between species identification and clarithromycin associated genetic polymorphisms that contribute to inducible and constitutive macrolide resistance. PCR and sequencing analysis was used to elucidate the subspecies, erm(41) genotypes and the presence of rrl mutations. M. abscessus subsp. massiliense was the dominant subspecies (70.2 %), followed by M. abscessus subsp. abscessus (23.8 %) and M. abscessus subsp. bolletii (5.9 %). The majority of M. abscessus and M. bolletii isolates possessed T28 erm(41) sequevar and were inducibly resistant to clarithromycin. All M. massiliense carried the truncated erm(41) and were largely clarithromycin-susceptible (98.3 %). Constitutive resistance involving rrl mutations was rare and seen in only 2 isolates (2.2 %). Subspecies identification was insufficient to predict clarithromycin susceptibility and required the genetic resistance to be determined via sequencing. In our context, rrl mutations were uncommon and may not be an essential test., UL https://www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/journal/jmm/10.1099/jmm.0.000576