In vitro activity of colistin against multidrug-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii isolates harboring blaOXA-23-like...

This study was aimed to evaluate occurrence of antibiotic resistance and the presence of resistance determinants among clinical isolates of Acinetobacter baumannii. This cross-sectional study from January to September 2018 was performed on 59 A. baumannii strains isolated from clinical samples in the north of Iran. Isolates were identified by standard microbiologic tests and molecular method. Antimicrobial susceptibility testing was carried out by disk diffusion and broth microdilution methods. The presence of carbapenem resistance genes was detected by PCR method. All isolates were resistant to cefepime, meropenem, imipenem and ceftazidime. The lowest resistance rate was observed against doxycycline with 33.9%. Minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) results showed that all carbapenem-resistant A. baumannii (CRAB) isolates were susceptible to colistin with MIC50 and MIC90 values of 1/2 µg/mL. Among 59 CRAB, blaOXA-23-like was the most prevalent gene (86.4%) followed by blaOXA-24-like (69.5%). Meanwhile, none of the clinical isolates harbored blaOXA-58-like gene. We found a high prevalence of CRAB strains harboring OXA-type carbapenemases in the north of Iran. Our results suggests that the presence of OXA-type genes was not directly correlated with the increase of imipenem MIC level, but can be clinically important as they contribute to the selection of CRAB strains.