Current status and changing trends of antimicrobial resistance in Saudi Arabia

Due to modern travel and ease of spread of infections, it is desirable to widen knowledge of susceptibility of common bacterial isolates from different parts of the world for optimal clinical management and control programs. Over the past decades, antimicrobial resistance has emerged in all kinds of micro-organisms worldwide including Saudi Arabia. this phenomenon is primarily due to increasing antibiotic use and misuse in humans, animals and agriculture. Additionally, the presence of a large expatriate population and a significant number of visitors to the Kingdom annually for pilgrimage and/or work from all over the world may have also facilitated the importation to Saudi Arabia of drug resistant micro-organisms from other countries. Saudi Arabia has witnessed an increase of drug resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Streptococcus pneumoniae, Staphylococcus aureus and some Enterobacteriaceae in the last decade. We describe the status of antimicrobial resistance in Saudi Arabia which is an important focus of antimicrobial resistance for the Gulf Region

Etiology of viral diseases in a tertiary care center in Saudi Arabia

In order to establish the prevalence and etiology of viral diseases at a tertiary care hospital in Saudi Arabia, clinical specimens from 38.978 patients were retrospectively evaluated over a 7 year period [1988-1994]. Virus particles were detected in clinical specimens from 3434 [8.8%] patients. The most common virus was herpes simplex [1646 patients], followed by cytomegalovirus [798 patients] and rotavirus [593 patients]. There were also 202 patients positive for adenovirus, 60 for respiratory syncytial virus, 29 for influenza, 8 for parainfluenza, 75 for enterovirus and 23 for varicella-zoster virus. The trends and characteristics of these findings in a specific Saudi population are discussed

Vancomycin-resistant enterococci [VRE] as normal flora of the intestine in patients at a tertiary care hospital

There has been a rapid increase in the incidence of infection and colonization with vancomycin-resistant enterococci [VRE] in American and European hospitals in the last six to seven years, with fecal carriage reported to be as high as 86% on some services. In order to determine the frequency of VRE as normal flora the intestine in Saudi patients, microbiological analysis of stool specimens from 4276 patients from a tertiary care referral hospital was performed. VRE, identified as Enterococcus f-aecium, was found in six patients None. of the patients had any clinical disease associated with VRE. Five were hospitalized patients, four with severe underlying diseases; five had a history of prior antimicrobial therapy with broad-spectrum antibodies and two of them were treated with vancomycin