Burn wound microflora and their sensitivity pattern: a prospective study

ABSTRACT

This prospective study was carried out on 60 consecutive patients admitted with acute burns. No such study has been done in Pakistan so far. Contamination rate of burn wounds at the end of first week was 73.8%, while it was 83.2% at the end of three weeks. Staph. aureus was found in 31.7% cases. Although Pseudomonas aeruginosa has been found to be the commonest cause of contamination in many previous reports, it was found in 22.2% cases in this study. Proteus mirabilis, E.Coli and Klebsiella were found prevalent in lesser number of cases. Streptococcus pyogenes was not isolated in any case. The sensitivity pattern reveals that most of Staph. aureus strains were resistant to ampicillin and cloxacillin. Amikacin and azactam were found effective against most of the organisms which were otherwise resistant to commonly used antibiotics