Relationship between slime production, antibiotic sensitivity and the phagetype of coagulase-negative staphylococci.
Three hundred and three strains of coagulase-negative staphylococci (CNS) were collected from the fingers of healthy donors (289) and from blood cultures (14). Twelve different species were identified (5 S. auricularis, 45 S. capitis, 15 S. cohnii, 86 S. epidermidis, 23 S. haemolyticus, 37 S. hominis, 1 S. lentus, 5 S. saprophyticus, 7 S. sciuri, 6 S. simulans, 54 S. xylosus and 19 S. warneri). Amongst these CNS strains, 151 were slime producers, 112 were phage-typable and 188, 133, 126 and 91 were, respectively, resistant to penicillin, teicoplanin, erythromycin and kanamycin. Slime-producing strains were resistant to at least seven antibiotics with a probability of 0.01 < P < 0.05. Non-slime-producing strains were sensitive to all the tested antibiotics with a probability of 0.001 < P < 0.01. There was no direct relationship between antibiotic sensitivity and phage type, although a non-typable strain was more often resistant to seven or more antibiotics than a typable one (0.05 < P < 0.1).
Boussard
P
P
Institut de Pharmacie, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium.
Pithsy
A
A
Devleeschouwer
M J
MJ
D000900:Anti-Bacterial Agents / Q000494:pharmacology; D001434:Bacteriophage Typing; D003030:Coagulase / Q000097:blood; D004352:Drug Resistance, Microbial; D013045:Species Specificity; D013210:Staphylococcus / Q000145:classification* / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology
D000900:Anti-Bacterial Agents; D003030:Coagulase