Antibiotic resistance and biofilm formation in children with Enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC) in Brazilian Amazon

Abstract

Introduction: Enteropathogenic Escherichia coli is an important causative agent of diarrhea in both developed and developing countries.
 Methodology: We assessed the antibiotic resistance profile and the ability of 71 Enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC) isolates from children in the age group 6 years, or younger, to form biofilm. These children were hospitalized in Cosme and Damião Children Hospital in Porto Velho, Western Brazilian Amazon, between 2010 and 2012, with clinical symptoms of acute gastroenteritis.
 Results: The highest frequency of atypical EPEC (aEPEC) isolates reached 83.1% (59/71). Most EPEC isolates presented Localized Adherence Like (LAL) pattern in HEp-2 cells (57.7% - 41/71). Biofilm production was observed in 33.8% (24/71) of EPEC isolates, and it means statistically significant association with shf gene (p = 0.0254). The highest antimicrobial resistance rates and a large number of multiresistant isolates 67.6% (48/71), regarded cefuroxime (CXM), ampicillin (AMP), trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole (SXT) and tetracycline (TET), respectively, mainly in typical EPEC (tEPEC). Furthermore, 96% (68/71) of EPEC isolates in the present study were resistant to at least one antibiotic, whereas only 3 isolates were sensitive to all the tested drugs.
 Conclusion: Based on our findings, there was increased aEPEC identification. EPEC isolates showed high resistance rate; most strains showed multiresistance; thus, they work as warning about the continuous need of surveillance towards antimicrobial use. Besides, the ability of forming biofilm was evidenced by the EPEC isolates. This outcome is worrisome, since it is a natural resistance mechanism of bacteria.

Antibacterial, antibiofilm, and anti-adhesion activities of Piper betle leaf extract against Avian pathogenic Escherichia coli

“…Adhesion is the rst step in the progress of bacterial infection, followed by colonization to host cells (Ali et al 2020). The process occurs in matrices that resemble bacteria attached to the pedestal, enabling the formation of bio lms (Rodrigues et al 2019). Bio lm formation is one of the hallmark strategies used by bacteria to survive in harsh environments (Gu et al 2019).…”

Antibiotic resistance trends for common bacterial aetiologies of childhood diarrhoea in low- and middle-income countries: A systematic review

“…Ciprofloxacin resistance increased from 2% to 9% in the AMR between 2003 and 2011 (Figure 3) [15,40]. Likewise, in the EMR, third generation cephalosporin resistance rose from low to moderate between 1996 and 2010, and then decreased drastically in 2016 (Figure 4) [15,20,44].…”

“…Twenty-seven studies looked at antibiotic resistance among E coli isolates for children aged 0-5 years , and five provided data for children aged 0-10 years [39][40][41][42][43]. Resistance levels among E coli isolates varied widely, with relatively high rates of resistance to ampicillin and tetracycline in the AFR (Figure 2), AMR (Figure 3), and EMR (Figure 4).…”

“…Nine studies evaluated antibiotic resistance of Salmonella isolates in children aged 0-5 years [12,13,22,27,34,[38][39][40][41] and four studies provided data for children aged 0-10 years [43,[45][46][47]. Moderate to high resistance to ampicillin among Salmonella spp was found in the AFR, EMR, and WPR.…”

Pandemic ST131Escherichia colipresenting the UPEC/EAEC and ExPEC/EAEC hybrid pathotypes recovered from extraintestinal infections in a clinical setting of the Brazilian Amazon region

“…However, there is a lack of association concerning the STs of such hybrid strains circulating in the country. Moreover, most of these reports on hybrid strains were restricted to São Paulo, a cosmopolitan city of the Southeast Brazilian region, and until now, all studies reporting E. coli infections in the Amazon Region were associated only with diarrheagenic infections [19][20][21][22]. Therefore, further studies are required to investigate the distribution and potential impact of these strains on the clinical outcomes of affected individuals.…”