ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: The emergence of multidrug-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii as a nosocomial pathogen is one of the major public health problems. The aim of this study was to evaluate the role of an efflux pump gene adeJ for the multidrug resistance of A. baumannii clinical isolates.METHODS: Two groups (MDRAB and SAB) of A. baumannii clinical isolates were studied. The SAB group consisted of strains that did not meet the criteria of MDRAB and were susceptible to more categories of antibiotics than MDRAB. Antimicrobial susceptibility results obtained by VITEKII system were used in data analysis and bacterial group allocation. We performed real-time reverse transcription PCR to determine relative expression of adeJ. We compared relative expression of adeJ in comparison groups by considering two viewpoints: i) MDRAB and SAB groups and ii) susceptible and non-susceptible groups for each antibiotic used in this study.RESULTS: The mean value of relative expression of adeJ of MDRAB and SAB groups was 1.4 and 0.92, respectively, and showed significant difference (P=0.002). The mean values of relative expression of adeJ of susceptible and non-susceptible groups to the antibiotics cefepime, ceftazidime, ciprofloxacin, imipenem, meropenem, tigecycline, piperacillin/tazobactam, ticarcillin/clavulanic acid, trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole, piperacillin, and gentamicin showed statistically significant differences.CONCLUSION: The overexpression of adeIJK might contribute to the multi-drug resistance in A. baumannii clinical isolates. Further, the overexpression of adeIJK might be one of the factors contributing to the resistance to numerous antibiotics.
Subject(s)
Acinetobacter baumannii , Acinetobacter , Anti-Bacterial Agents , Ceftazidime , Ciprofloxacin , Drug Resistance, Multiple , Gentamicins , Imipenem , Piperacillin , Polymerase Chain Reaction , Public Health , Reverse Transcription , Statistics as TopicABSTRACT
Objective To detect the distribution of resistance-nodulation (RND)efflux pump system of Acineto-bacter baumannii (AB),and explore the relationship between its’expression and antimicrobial resistance.Methods Fifty-nine strains of multidrug-resistant AB isolated from clinical specimens in The First Affiliated Hospital of Nan-chang University were identified and performed antimicrobial susceptibility analysis,distribution of RND efflux sys-tem of AB was detected by polymerase chain reaction(PCR),expression of efflux pump genes in different drug-re-sistant phenotypes of AB was compared,relationship between the expression level and drug resistance was analyzed, amplified products of RND efflux system were sequenced.Results Resistance rates of AB to ampicillin/sulbactam, imipenem,gentamicin,ciprofloxacin,and levofloxacin were 93.2%,94.9%,88.1%,96.6%,and 52.5% respec-tively.PCR detection results of efflux pump and integron genes of 59 AB strains revealed that the carrying rates of adeR,adeS,adeB,adeJ,and adeG genes were 81.4%,91.5%,93.2%,100.0%,and 61.0% respectively.The expression of efflux pump genes in different strains was different,expression levels of ade B and adeJ genes among gentamicin,imipenem,ampicillin/sulbactam resistant AB group and non-resistant AB group were significantly dif- ferent (all P＜0.05).There was no mutation or insertion sequence in the base sequences of regulatory genes ade R and ade S of adeABC efflux pump.Conclusion RND efflux pump system is universally present in AB,the expres-sion upregulation of ade B and ade J genes in RND efflux pump system is related with antimicrobial resistance of bacteria to gentamycin,imipenem,and ampicillin-sulbactam.