Abstract:
A prospective study on various clinical isolates from patients admitted from various parts of NWFP and
Afghanistan at Post Graduate Medical Institute (PGMI) Hayatabad Medical Complex, Peshawar was conducted from January 2000 to December 2004 to ascertain the prevalence and antimicrobial susceptibility of
Pseudomonas aeruginosa infections. Among 4709 positive isolates, 314 (6.67%) were Pseudomonas
aeruginosa. The highest rate of infection due to Pseudomonas aeruginosa was observed in orthopedic ward
(24.61%) and OPD (20%), in other wards the infection was between 13% to 1.5%. Gender-wise prevalence
showed 61.78% male and 38.22% females were infected by Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The highest percentage of Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolates were observed in pus (57.64 %) and urine (24.2 %)
samples. Maximum Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolates were found between March to August and the highest
percentage 13.846% was observed in June. Using the disc diffusion method, the resistance patterns of 314
isolates against 14 antimicrobial agents were determined. The highest resistance was observed against
ampicillin (≥ 98.4%), ampicillin/ sulbactam (85.3%), co-amoxiclave (83.8%) and ofloxacin (68.4%) and least
resistance was observed against amikacin (24%). Similarly the MIC for ampicillin (4 to >2048 µg/ml),
ampicillin/sulbactam (1 to 2048 µg/ml) and co-amoxiclave (1 to >2048 µg/ml) against clinical isolates of
Pseudomonas aeruginosa was also high. High resistance of Pseudomonas aeruginosa against various
commonly used antibiotics showed the alarming situation. The control of drug resistant Pseudomonas
aeruginosa required rational prescribing and proper use of antibiotics.
