ABSTRACT
Background: Clindamycin resistance among clinically significant staphylococcal isolates is now increasing. Routine testing of staphylococcal isolates for inducible clindamycin resistance [ICR] is advocated by the Clinical Laboratory Standards Institute [CLSI]. Automated system Vitek 2 offers a panel that detects inducible clindamycin resistance directly. It is easy and more cost-effective than the more labor-intensive CLSI reference methods
Objectives: The aim of this study was to assess the performance of Vitek-2 system for ICR detection against the reference D-test, as well as to detect the presence of erm-A and erm-C genes among these isolates
Methodology: 22 clinical staphylococcal isolates [15 Staph aureus and 7 coagulase negative Staph [CoNS] were examined for ICR both by D- test and Vitek-2 system. multiplex PCR was performed for the isolates to detect ermA and ermC genes
Results: Out of the 22 isolates, ICR was detected by Vitek-2 in 6 isolates [27.7%]. five of the 6 isolates were confirmed by D-test. sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values were calculated as 100%, 94.1%, 83.33% and 100% respectively. ermC gene was detected in 20/22 isolates, 5 isolates were positive for both genes
Conclusion: Vitek-2 is considered a potentially reliable test for detection of ICR, further studies are recommended on large number of isolates