Abstract
The present investigation was undertaken to assess the prevalence of extended-spectrum β-lactamases (ESβLs) among urinary tract infection (UTI) isolates. During 4 months in 2004, a total of 650 Enterobacteriaceae strains from UTIs was collected by five clinical microbiology laboratories located in southern Italy and the β-lactamase production was investigated. A total of 50 of the 650 isolates were double-disk positive and suspected of producing an ESβL; Escherichia coli (36.0%) and Klebsiella pneumoniae (32.0%) were the most common species among all ESβL producers. Characterization of ESβL determinants was carried out by the colony blot hybridization method, and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and DNA sequencing in order to identify the presence of bla TEM, bla SHV, bla PER, and bla CTX-M determinants. The ESβL variants found in this study were the following: TEM-15, TEM-24, TEM-52, TEM-134, SHV-12, CTX-M-1, CTX-M-3, CTX-M-15, and PER-1. As expected, the majority of the isolates were found to be susceptible to imipenem (94%), cefepime (54%) and piperacillin-tazobactam (54%). The results of this survey show the prevalence of ESβL enzymes among enterobacterial pathogens causing UTIs in southern Italy.
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