1 Laboratoire de Microbiologie Médicale, Fondation Hôpital Saint-Joseph, 185, rue Raymond Losserand, 75674 Paris cedex 14; 2 Service de Microbiologie-Hygiène, Hôpital Ambroise Paré AP-HP, Université Versailles-Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines-UFR Médicale Paris-Ile-de-France-Ouest, Boulogne-Billancourt, France
Sir,
Klebsiella oxytoca is an opportunistic pathogen that has been involved in various nosocomial infections.1 K. oxytoca carries a chromosomal class A ß-lactamase called K1, or KOXY. When the corresponding bla gene is under the control of a strong promoter, KOXY is overproduced and responsible for the loss of susceptibility to ceftriaxone and aztreonam.2 However, because of the presence of synergy between ceftriaxone, cefotaxime, cefpirome, cefepime or aztreonam and clavulanic acid, loss of susceptibility can be mistaken for plasmid-mediated, extended-spectrum ß-lactamase (ESBL). This mistake leads to interpreting such isolates as non-susceptible to any third generation cephalosporins as well as aztreonam. This is because several Antibiogram Committees, notably the French Antibiogram Committee, have recommended interpreting in this manner the ß-lactam susceptibility of ESBLA-producing isolates. Another difficulty encountered for assessing the ß-lactam susceptibility of KOXY-overproducing isolates is the poor reproducibility of their antibiograms, which seems to be related to a significant inoculum effect.
The present study was therefore performed to evaluate the MICs of different ß-lactam molecules for KOXY-overproducing K. oxytoca isolates tested with increasing inocula.
The sixteen K. oxytoca clinical isolates studied displayed a decreased susceptibility to aztreonam and no synergy between ceftazidime and clavulanic acid. The overproduction of the KOXY ß-lactamases in these isolates was assessed by promoter sequencing. We found in the KOXY promoter of each isolate one of the two following mutations: G-8A or G-12T in the 10 region. As previously described by Fournier et al.,3 these mutations are responsible for overproduction of KOXY. The absence of other ß-lactamases was checked by using the electro-focusing method. Escherichia coli ATCC 25922 was used as a control strain.
MICs of ceftriaxone, cefotaxime, cefpirome, cefepime, aztreonam and ceftazidime were determined for three different inocula (104, 105 and 106 cfu/mL) by using the MuellerHinton broth dilution method as recommended by the NCCLS. Antibiotic powders were provided by their manufacturers.
As indicated in Table 1, an increase in inoculum from 104 to 106 cfu/mL resulted in a strong increase in MIC50 of all the ß-lactams tested, except for ceftazidime. However, the individual isolate analysis showed that MICs varied widely independently of the ß-lactam molecule and the inoculum tested. For the lowest (104 cfu/mL) as well as the standard (105 cfu/mL) inocula, certain isolates were susceptible (MIC < 4 mg/L) and others resistant to the different ß-lactams tested. The exception to this was ceftazidime, to which all of the isolates remained susceptible. Using an inoculum 106 cfu/mL should clearly discriminate antibiotics that are stable to KOXY ß-lactamase (ceftazidime) from those that are inactivated by K. oxytoca overproducing this ß-lactamase (ceftriaxone, cefotaxime, cefepime, cefpirome and aztreonam).
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Acknowledgements
This paper was presented in part at the Forty-first Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, Chicago, IL, USA, 2001 (poster D-179).
Footnotes
* Corresponding author. Tel: +33-1-44-12-36-50; Fax: +33-1-44-12-32-34; E-mail: fgoldstein{at}hopital-saint-joseph.org
References
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