Multi-resistant salmonella ohio infections at the University Hospital of the West Indies - abstract

ABSTRACT

During 1982-83, there was a substantial increase in the number of S.ohio infections at the University Hospital of the West Indies, which coincided with the appearance of strains resistant to chloramphenicol, cotrimoxazole, ampicillin, neomycin and carbenicillin. Multi-resistant strains of S.ohio accounted for 71 of the 367 salmonella isolates during this period (19.3 percent). All of the 40 strains tested were able to transfer resistance determinants to E. coli, K12J53-2. S.ohio was cultured from stool (60), blood (5), wounds and abscesses (4), and post-mortem material (2). Eighty per cent of infections occurred in children less than two years of age and was often associated with gastroenteritis in malnourished children. Two infants with severe gastroenteritis and bronchopneumonia died. There were a number of unusual S.ohio isolates, including 2 cases of septicaemia in children receiving chloramphenicol for H. influenzae meningitis, a scrotal abscess secondary to extravasion of urine and infected scabies in a child with marasmic kwashiorkor. The emergence of a multi-resistant S.ohio capable of transferring antibiotic resistance to other organisms is of particular concern where S.typhi is endemic (AU)