Prevalence of Proteus species with reduced susceptibility to imipenem isolated from a tertiary referral hospital in Malaysia

Aims@#Proteus species are implicated as serious causes of various human infections. Imipenem has been used to treat infections caused by these organisms. However, Proteus spp. are known to have reduced susceptibility and have elevated minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) towards imipenem. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of Proteus species with reduced susceptibility to imipenem and the antibiotic susceptibility pattern for each Proteus species. @*Methodology and results@#A total of 204 Proteus isolates were collected from routine samples. All isolates were identified by using VITEK® 2 GN ID card. Antibiotic susceptibility tests were done by using disc diffusion method and imipenem E-test. While 5.9% of the Proteus isolates showed reduced susceptibility towards imipenem by disc diffusion, only 1% (2 out of 204 isolates) has reduced susceptibility by E-test. @*Conclusion, significance and impact of study@#The prevalence of Proteus species with reduced susceptibility to imipenem is still low. The imipenem zone diameter does not truly reflect the MIC value and thus, in any isolates which are tested to have reduced susceptibility or resistant to imipenem should always be followed by imipenem MIC method.

TP53 polymorphisms are involved in inverse colorectal cancer comorbidity in Chinese schizophrenia patients / 国际检验医学杂志

The inverse cancer comorbidity in schizophrenia patients may be related to the genetic factors ,involving the regu‐lation of apoptosis .The tumour suppressor gene TP53 ,involved in neural apoptosis ,is one of the potential candidate genes associat‐ed with schizophrenia which might reduce colorectal cancer risk .We recruited 270 schizophrenia patients and 312 colorectal cancer patients without schizophrenia .To examine the genetic association between schizophrenia and colorectal cancer ,we analysed eight SNPs (rs12951053 ,rs1625895 ,rs2909430 ,rs9895829 ,rs1042522 ,rs8079544 ,rs8064946 ,rs17806770) covering 14 .35 kb in the re‐gion of TP53 .We observed that one of the eight genetic polymorphisms showed statistically significant differences between the colo‐rectal cancer subjects and the schizophrenia subjects (rs12951053 ,P=0 .000 1 ,OR 1 .70 ,95% CI 1 .30-2 .23) .In addition ,the hap‐lotype of A‐G (rs12951053‐rs8064946) ,giving a global P=0 .001 8 ,was the most significant .Our data indicate that the polymor‐phisms of rs12951053 in TP53 confer reduced susceptibility to colorectal cancer and suggest a potential protective mechanism a‐gainst colorectal cancer in the schizophrenia patients of Han Chinese origin .