Salmonella spp. in Aquaculture: An Exploratory Analysis (Integrative Review) of Microbiological Diagnoses between 2000 and 2020

SIMPLE SUMMARY: Salmonellosis is characterized by a gastrointestinal infection resulting from the ingestion of water and food contaminated by bacteria of the genus Salmonella, of which causes enterocolitis. Although infections are acute and self-limiting, efforts to prevent this problem of interest to global public health are important. Salmonella spp. is distributed in different environments and animal species; therefore, meat derived from animal production is one of the main routes of human infection, increasing the importance of research focusing on microbiological quality and food safety. Aquaculture is a constantly growing sector in the world, and the monitoring of Salmonella spp. in fish products is important for public health due to the risks of contamination during all stages of production. In this context, the present study carried out a systematic integrative review of the microbiological diagnoses of Salmonella spp. in aquaculture between 2000 and 2020 with the objective of characterizing and contributing to the promotion of measures to control and prevent this pathogen in aquaculture production. A database generated was composed of information that was mined from articles such as the most sampled aquaculture species, the microbiological diagnostic method(s) conducted in the investigation of Salmonella spp., and the main reported serotypes. ABSTRACT: The present study aimed to characterize, through descriptive statistics, data from scientific articles selected in a systematic integrative review that performed a microbiological diagnosis of Salmonella spp. in aquaculture. Data were obtained from research articles published in the BVS, Scielo, Science Direct, Scopus and Web of Science databases. The selected studies were published between 2000 and 2020 on samples of aquaculture animal production (fish, shrimp, bivalve mollusks, and other crustaceans) and environmental samples of aquaculture activity (farming water, soil, and sediments). After applying the exclusion criteria, 80 articles were selected. Data such as country of origin, categories of fish investigated, methods of microbiological diagnosis of Salmonella spp., sample units analyzed and most reported serovars were mined. A textual analysis of the word cloud and by similarity and descending hierarchical classification with the application of Reinert’s algorithm was performed using R(®) and Iramuteq(®) software. The results showed that a higher percentage of the selected articles came from Asian countries (38.75%). Fish was the most sampled category, and the units of analysis of the culture water, muscle and intestine were more positive. The culture isolation method is the most widespread, supported by more accurate techniques such as PCR. The most prevalent Salmonella serovars reported were S. Typhimurium, S. Weltevreden and S. Newport. The textual analysis showed a strong association of the terms “Salmonella”, “fish” and “water”, and the highest hierarchical class grouped 25.4% of the associated text segments, such as “aquaculture”, “food” and “public health”. The information produced characterizes the occurrence of Salmonella spp. in the aquaculture sector, providing an overview of recent years. Future research focusing on strategies for the control and prevention of Salmonella spp. in fish production are necessary and should be encouraged.