Bacteriological profile of wound infections and antimicrobial resistance in selected gram-negative bacteria

Managing wound infections is a challenging task. Understanding their resistance pattern is an essential step at reducing its burden in hospital settings.

To determine the bacteriological diversity of wound infections and the antimicrobial resistance exhibited by a selected Gram-negative bacterium in the Aljouf region of Saudi Arabia.

The study retrospectively analysed the antibiograms of wound infections from hospitalized patients for the year 2019. The European Centre for Disease Control guidelines were adopted for the classification of resistant bacteria. Multidrug-, extensive drug-, and carbapenem-resistant isolates are presented as frequencies and percentages.

A total of 295 non-duplicate wound swab antibiograms were retrieved, 64.4% (190) and 35.6% (105) isolates were Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacterial infections respectively. Predominant pathogens included Staphylococcus species 21.0% (62), E. coli 16.3% (48) and K. pneumoniae 13.5% (40). 148 (77.9%), 42 (22.1%) and 43 (22.6%) of the Gram-negative isolates were multidrug-, extensively drug- and carbapenem-resistant. The antibiotic resistance exhibited by gram-negative bacteria was 43.4% (234/539), 59.1% (224/379) and 53.7% (101/188) towards carbapenems, 3^rd - and 4^th - generation cephalosporins.

The majority of wound infections are caused by multidrug-, extensively drug- and carbapenem-resistant Gram-negative bacteria. Further studies should focus on the molecular basis of this resistance.