Aerobic bacteria in post surgical wound infections and pattern of their antimicrobial susceptibility in Ayder Teaching and Referral Hospital, Mekelle, Ethiopia

BACKGROUND: Post surgical wound infections are global problem in the field of surgery associated with long hospital stay, higher treatment expenditure, morbidity and mortality. Hence to address the limited data in Ethiopia on post surgical wound infections, we conducted this research to determine the prevalence and antimicrobial susceptibility patterns of aerobic bacteria in post-surgical wound infected patients in Ayder teaching and referral hospital, Mekelle, Ethiopia. METHODS: Hospital based prospective cross sectional study was carried-out in 128 patients who had undergone surgery in general surgery and orthopaedic wards, and showed symptoms of infection clinically from January to June 2012. Standard bacteriological methods were used for bacterial isolation and antimicrobial susceptibility pattern. RESULTS: A total of 128 patients (98 male and 30 female) with clinical signs of post surgical wound infections were enrolled. The age of the patients ranged from 15–79 years (with mean 35.95 ± 19.01 years). Out of the 128 wound swabs taken, 96/128 (75%) were culture positive aerobically, yielding 123 bacterial isolates. Out of these the predominant bacterial isolates were Staphylococcus aureus 44 (35.77%), Klebsiella species 29 (22.76%) and Coagulase negative Staphylococci (CoNS) 18 (14.63%). No bacterial isolates was found to be sensitive to all antibiotics tested. Isolated bacteria showed 102/123 (82.92%) multi drug resistance to the commonly used antibiotics in the hospital. However, 54/ 65 (83.1%) of Gram negative and 58/58 (100%) of Gram positive isolates were sensitive to Gentamicin and Vancomycin, respectively. CONCLUSION: Prevalence of was Post-operative wound infections rate in this current study was 75% and multi drug resistance was seen in 102/123(82.92%) of the isolates leaving clinicians with few choices of drugs for the treatment of post surgical wound infected patients. This underscores for periodic surveillance of etiologic agent and antibiotic susceptibility to prevent further emergence and spread of resistant bacteria pathogens.