Objective: Klebsiella pneumoniae is responsible for infections of hospitalized patients and compromised individuals. Persistent exposure of K. pneumoniae to antimicrobial agents facilitated the emergence of multidrug-resistant strains and the non-susceptible. The primary aim of this study was to evaluate the epidemiology of K. pneumoniae MDR during the years 2015-2017 in “G. Martino” University Hospital of Messina.
Materials and Methods: Vitek 2 automated system (bioMérieux, Italy) was used for isolate identification and antimicrobial susceptibility testing. We focused our attention on the isolates possibly producing carbapenemases.
Results: During the period 2015-2017, 1,563 non-duplicated strains of K. pneumoniae were isolated from different inpatients, specimen and wards in our hospital. We observed a decrease in the occurrence of isolated of the K. pneumoniae from blood cultures.
Conclusions: To explain the strong decrement of resistance to carbapenems in ICUs and GSCUs we hypothesized that there is not selective pressure for the establishment and maintenance of bacterial populations resistant to multiple antimicrobial compounds within this hospital, except for VSUs, where the selective pressure seems to be high.