TITLE:
Multidrug Resistant Pattern and Plasmid Detection of Escherichia coli from Various Sources within the University of Port Harcourt
AUTHORS:
Obakpororo Ejiro Agbagwa, Oyi Nato Okorafor, Seleipiri Jemina Horsfall
KEYWORDS:
Escherichia coli, Multidrug, Plasmid, Resistance
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Medical Microbiology,
Vol.12 No.1,
March
2,
2022
ABSTRACT: Multi-drug resistance (MDR) in Enterobacteriaceae poses critical public health threat in Nigeria
and the global world. This resistant mechanism might be plasmid mediated or
chromosomal. Escherichia coli are
Gram negative pathogen with a global distribution rate. The study was carried
out to determine MDR and plasmid profiling of E. coli isolates from
urine, feaces and poultry litter. The samples were cultured on eosine methylene
blue agar and incubated for 24 hours at 37°C. Results obtained showed a percentage prevalence of 30% for the urine samples which were the most prevalent, while the prevalence of E. coli from the feacal and
poultry litter was 8% and 28% respectively. Identified E. coli were screened for antibiotic susceptibility by Kirby Bauer diffusion
method. The results on susceptibility of E. coli to tested antibiotics before plasmid curing showed 100% resistance to
cefuroxime and augumentin, while 75% resistance was observed in gentamicine,
ciprofloxacin and ofloxacine. Cefixime and cefdazidime resistance were 62.5% on E. coli and the least resistance was
observed in nitrofurantion (25%). The poultry litter and urine isolates
recorded lower resistance level to antibiotics, compared to the feacal isolates.
After plasmid curing the percentage of resistance reduced. The only antibiotics
that responded positively was nitrofurantion, with high sensitivity of 87% for
feacal isolate, 100% for urine isolates, and 78% for poultry litter isolates
after plasmid curing. Twenty (20) of the thirty seven (37) isolates were still
resistant to more than two antibiotics after the plasmid curing. Of the twenty
isolates, 18 (90%)
were found to harbor single plasmid, while 2 (10%) did not possess plasmid. This study concludes
that nitrofurantion was the most effective antibiotics on Escherichia coli and plasmids were responsible partly for
resistance.