Antimicrobial susceptibility patterns and their correlate for urinary tract infection pathogens at Kitwe Central Hospital, Zambia.

Abstract

Inadequate data on antimicrobial susceptibility patterns in the Africa region and indeed in Zambia have led to ineffective empirical treatment before the culture and sensitivity results are made available. The purpose of this study was to determine the antimicrobial susceptibility patterns amongest the most common bacterial causes of UTIs amongest patients presenting at Kitwe Central Hospital (KCH), Zambia. A 5-year record review of data captured in the laboratory urine register from 2008 to 2013 was conducted. Demographic data, culture and antimicrobial susceptibility data were entered in Epi Info version 7 and analysed using SPSS version 17.0. Associations were determined using the Chi-squared test at the 5% significance level. A total of 1854 records were extracted from the laboratory register. The highest frequency of UTI (43.9%) was in the 15–29 years age group. The overall sensitivity patterns indicated that E.coli was mostly sensitive to ciprofloxacin (69.8%), Klebsiella species to ciprofloxacin (68.2%), Proteus species to cefotaxime (66.7%) and Staphylococcus saprophyticus to nitrofuratoin (63.7%). Sensitivity for E. coli to nalidixic acid was higher for males (58.6%) than females (39.5%). Sensitivity for E. coli to cefotaxime and norfloxacin varied with age (Chi-squared for trend=10.32, p=0.001). Our results have shown that UTI pathogens isolated at KCH were less than 70% sensitive to the recommended and used antibiotic. Studies to establish highly sensitive antibiotics to UTI pathogens are needed to effectively treat patients.