Bacterial agents causing gastroenteritis in various patient populations from South Florida

A respective review was done on all stool specimens submitted for culture during an 18 month period at 5 hospitals in South Florida. The patient population seen at these hospitals was heterogeneous. All laboratories used a similar methodology for the isolation of enteric pathogens. The number of isolates from all institutions were as follows: (table; see text) The majority of Salmonella und Shigella isolates were from pediatric patients whereas Campylobacter was the major bacterial isolate in the adult population. Yersinia enterocolitica was an infrequent bacterial isolate and was only isolated from pediatric patients. No major outbreak of infection was detected. The distribution of Salmonella serotypes was in agreement with the serotype distribution reported in the United States. Approximately 58% of the isolates were serogroup B, 19% were serogroup C and 13% were serogroup D. Over two-thirds of the Shigella isolates were Shigella sonnei followed by S. flexneri, S. dysenteriae and S. boydii accounted for less than 3% of the isolates. Antibiotic resistance among Salmonella for ampicillin, tetracycline and chloramphenicol was 13%, 19% and 5%, respectively. Most resistant isolates were serogroup B. Overall, 40% of Shigella isolates were resistant to ampicillin, 15% resistant to tetracycline and 4% resistant to chloramphenicol.