Research Article
Okon, K.O, Shittu AO, Usman H,
Abstract
Ninety-six consecutive, non-duplicate S .aureus isolates from clinical specimens were colle cted between January through December 2007, from six ter tiary hospitals in northeastern Nigeria and analysed by phenotypic and molecular methods. Of th e 96 S .aureus isolates,12 (12.5%) MRSA isolates were identified by disc diffusion and confirmed by PCR assay. Twelve MRSA and 4MSSA isolates exhibited multiresistant pattern to the commonly u sed antibiotics, 3 of the 12 MRSA were sensitive to clindamycin while all the S .aureus (MRSA and MSSA) isolates were susceptible t o vancomycin, mupirocin and fusidic acid. Overall antibiotic susc eptibility pattern, penicillin (92.1%), gentamicin (14.6%), erythromycin (15.6%), cotrimoxazole (19.8% ), ciprofloxacin(15.6), clindamycin(9.4%) and rifampicin (2.1%). The SCCmec typing of the MRSA is olates by two standard typing methods revealed presence of uncharacterised SCCmec element. The MRS A prevalence of 12.5 percent may be considered to be high in an environment without pre vious surveillance studies. The multiresistant pattern of the pathogens to frontline antibiotics posed serious public health problem, because of cos t and unavailability of alternate chemothrauptic opti on like vancomycin. The non-definition of SCCmec types affirmed divergent element of staphylococca l flora.