Emergence of carbapenem resistant Acinetobacter baumannii clonal complexes CC2 and CC10 among fecal carriages in an educational hospital

ABSTRACT

Carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii strains are increasing worldwide. In this study, samples were collected from hospital environments, extra hospital environments, and fecal carriages. 76% (89/117) of bacterial isolates were detected as A. baumannii strains. The imipenem resistance in the hospital environment, fecal carriages, extra hospital environments, and clinical isolates was 37.7% (17/45), 100% (9/9), 0% (0/45), and 92.9% (92/99), respectively. The blaVIM and blaOXA-23 were detected in 6.6% (3/45) and 2.2% (1/45) of strains isolated from hospital environments. Interestingly, strains isolated from fecal carriages had blaVIM, blaOXA-23, and blaIMP genes which resembled carbapenem resistance genes in clinical strains. The structure of clonal relatedness among all non-clinical isolates was as follows: CC2, 37% (33/89); CC1, 22.4% (20/89); CC3, 12.3% (11/89); CC25, 7.8% (7/89); CC10, 4.4% (4/89) and CC15, 2.2% (2/89). Comparison of clonal relatedness among clinical and non-clinical isolates indicated that widespread clones including CC2, CC3, and CC10 were common clonal complexes between two categories.

KEYWORDS:

• Carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii
• clonal complex
• non-clinical isolates

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the personnel in the bacteriology department of the Pasture Institute of Iran for their help. This research was supported by the Pasture Institute of Iran.

Conflict of interest

The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.

Ethical statement

For collecting from fecal carriages, this project was done based on ethical guidelines as previously approved by the Pasteur Institute of Iran (IR.PII.REC.1395.51).

Additional information

Funding

Funding information is not applicable/No funding was received.