OCCURRENCE AND ANTIBIOTIC RESISTANT PHENOTYPES OF STAPHYLOCOCCUS AUREUS ISOLATED FROM SOME HOSPITAL ENVIRONMENTS IN NASARAWA TOWN, NASARAWA STATE, NIGERIA

Aliyu Y.*, Jibril U. Y., Jibrin S. M. and Salawu E. M.

ABSTRACT

This work was aimed at determining the occurrence and antibiogram of Staphylococcus aureus isolated from some hospital environments in Nasarawa town, Nasarawa State, Nigeria. Out of the 160 swab samples collected in this study, 52 were positive for S. aureus with an overall prevalence rate of 32.56%. Out of these, 28 positive samples were obtained from Henad Medical Centre, 16 positive samples from Alpha Hospital, and 8 positive samples from the Polytechnic Clinic. The prevalence rate for Henad Medical Centre was 40.0%, it was 26.76% for both Alpha Hospital and the Polytechnic Clinic respectively. The Henad Medical Centre was observed to have had a higher prevalence of the bacterium than Alpha Hospital and the Polytechnic Clinic. This may not be unconnected with the number of samples collected from this healthcare centre. A relatively larger sample size (70) was collected from Henad Medical Centre compared to the 60 and 30 samples collected from Alpha Hospital and the Polytechnic Clinic respectively. This was based on the number of patients that visits the three hospitals to seek medical attention. The antibiotic susceptibility profile of the isolates indicate that, majority of them were highly susceptible to ciprofloxacin, gentamicin, rifampicin, chloramphenicol, and levofloxacin. The isolates were observed to have developed high resistance to amoxil, ampiclox, and erythromycin. Eight (8) antibiotic resistance phenotypes were observed with varying combinations of 2,3, and 4 antibiotics. All the isolates had multiple antibiotics resistance (MAR) index of 0.2 and above.

Keywords: Staphylococcus aureus, hospital environments, antibiogram, Nasarawa town, Nigeria.