Biofilm formation is a complicated microbiological process and one of the distinctive features of pathogenic bacteria. Biofilms are a cluster of bacterial cells enclosed in extra polymeric substances and irreversibly attached onto a surface. Biofilms have a major impact on public health as biofilm associated bacteria are able to survive and populate in indwelling medical devices, causing severe nosocomial and recurrent infections. Biofilm-embedded bacteria have unique characteristics which are harder to destroy than the planktonic forms. Especially biofilm bacteria are highly resistant to antimicrobial agents. Treating patients undergoing long term urinary catheterization is becoming complicated by encrustation and blockage due to crystalline biofilm formation inside the lumen of catheters. Further, all types of indwelling catheters including silver or nitrofurazone-coated devices are

Biofilm is defined as microbial-derived sessile communities enclosed with extra polymeric substances and characterized by cells that are irreversibly attached to a surface. Biofilm bacteria are a serious threat to public health as biofilm formation of bacteria in indwelling medical devices especially in urinary catheters causes persistent infections resistant to treatment with antimicrobial agents. The present study focused to screen the biofilm-producing bacteria from the indwelling urinary catheters. Both short-term and long-term urinary catheters were collected from the catheterized patients admitted in the national and a private hospital. Bacterial population removed from the catheters were tested for biofilm production by widely used three methods such as Tube method, Congo Red Agar method, and Tissue Culture Plate method. In this preliminary screening, the major biofilm producer identified in the present study is E.Coli in all types of catheters. Further, biofilm-producing bacteria were predominantly detected in long-term catheters than short-term catheters. In addition, the identification of more than one bacterial strain in long-term catheters revealed that bacterial diversity increases with the duration of catheterization. The results of the present study revealed that long-term urinary catheters have the potential for survival and diverse biofilm-producing bacteria.