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Alternatives to carbapenems in ESBL-producing Escherichia coli infections
D Fournier1, C Chirouze, J Leroy
1Service de bactériologie, centre hospitalier universitaire de Besançon, 25030 Besançon, France.
Objectives:
The authors had for objective to assess the activity of a wide panel of antibiotics on extended-spectrum-β-lactamase producing Escherichia coli isolates (ESBL-Ec), because of the sharp increase of their frequency, leading to an increased use of carbapenems.
Material And Methods:
We selected 100 ESBL-Ec in which ESBLs were identified by PCR and sequencing, between 2009 and 2010. We determined the MICs of amoxicillin-clavulanate, piperacillin-tazobactam, temocillin, mecillinam, cefoxitin, cefotaxime, ceftazidime, aztreonam, tigecycline, nitrofurantoin, and fosfomycin using reference methods. The susceptibility profiles were defined according to EUCAST 2012 recommendations.
Results:
Fosfomycin, nitrofurantoin, and pivmecillinam were active against more than 90% of isolates and remain excellent choices for the oral treatment of urinary tract infections (UTIs). Temocillin and piperacillin-tazobactam are also good candidates for the treatment of pyelonephritis or bloodstream infections. Only 27, 23, and 8% of isolates were susceptible to ceftazidime, cefepime, and cefotaxime, respectively.
Conclusion:
Our study results prove that in many cases, there are non-carbapenem alternatives for the treatment of ESBL-Ec infections.
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