Isolation and current trend in antimicrobial resistance for Shigella in diarrhea patients in New Delhi: Hospital-based study

Abstract

Introduction: Shigella species, members of the family Enterobacteriaceae, are responsible for causing acute gastroenteritis which is one of the most common causes of morbidity and mortality in children in developing countries. Among others, Shigellosis represents a major burden of disease, especially in developing countries, and is estimated to affect more than 160 million human beings are infected by the microorganism annually and that approximately 1.1 million die. Materials & Methods: The study was undertaken at the Department of Microbiology in Maulana Azad Medical College & Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital, tertiary care, New Delhi India, from January 2012 to December 2016. The samples were processed according to standard bacteriological procedure. Resistance patterns of the shigella isolates to various antibiotics were determined by the agar diffusion technique. Results: A total of 9577 stool specimens were collected, of diarrhea /dysentery patients during the study period (January 2012 to December 2016). A total of 100 strains of shigella species were isolated thus showing a prevalence of 1.04%. The commonest species isolated was S. flexneri (55%), followed by S. boydii (19%), S. sonnei (15%) and S. dysentery (11%). All the isolates were sensitive to erythromycin, trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole and aztreonam and showed variable resistance against the remaining antibiotics. Conclusion: Limited laboratory diagnosis in developing countries imposes clinicians to syndromic diagnosis and empirical prescription of broad spectrum antibiotics that led drug resistant bacterial strains to emerge. More emphasis should be given towards supply of safe water and health education for the community.