Prevalence of Efflux Pump Genes in Multidrug Resistant Acinetobacter Baumannii Isolates From Intensive Care Units in An Egyptian Hospital

Abstract

Background and Objectives: Acinetobacter baumannii (A. baumannii) is a nightmare hospital acquired pathogen causing different infections that are problematic to treat due to multidrug resistance acquired by efflux pump mechanisms. One of the most important efflux pumps is AdeABC that is encoded by a group of genes, the prevalence of two of them (adeB and adeS genes) among hospital acquired A. baumannii infections were investigated in this study.

Materials and Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 50 isolates of A. baumannii were obtained from patients in ICUs of a tertiary hospital in Egypt. The sensitivity to different antibiotics was tested by the disc diffusion and broth dilution methods as stated by CLSI guidelines. AdeB and adeS genes were detected by the PCR method.

Results:The highest proportion of the isolates were resistant to Gentamycin, Amikacin, Tobramycin, Levofloxacin, Imipenem, Meropenem, Ampicillin/sulbactam & Piperacillin-Tazobactam, while all strains showed intermediate resistance to Colistin. All multidrug resistant isolates showed adeB gene while adeS gene was found in only 95% of the isolates.

Conclusion:AdeB and adeS genes are highly prevalent among hospital acquired multidrug resistant A. baumannii, therefore they are considered a mark of resistance