Bacterial Profile and Antimicrobial Resistance Pattern from Dif-Ferent Clinical Specimens at Uttara Adhunik Medical College Hospital, Dhaka

Introduction: Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is an urgent global public health problem. It threatens effective treatment of infections and leads to prolonged duration of illness, higher morbidity and mortality rates, and an increased cost of health care. The effectiveness of currently available antibiotics is decreasing as a result of increasing resistant strains among clinical isolates. Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the bacterial profile and AMR patterns of bacterial isolates from different clinical specimens at Uttara Adhunik Medical College Hospital (UAMCH), Dhaka. Material and methods: This retrospective study was carried out at UAMCH in Bangladesh from January 2017 to December 2019. In total 32,187 clinical specimens such as urine, blood, stool, wound swab/pus, and sputum were collected and processed at the Microbiology laboratory. Among these, 4232 were positive culture samples. Standard bacteriological methods were employed to identify the bacteria, and Kirby-Bauer disc diffusion methods were used in accordance with CLSI guidelines to assess the bacteria's susceptibility to various antibiotics. Data were entered, cleaned, and analyzed using the WHONET software developed by the WHO Collaborating Centre for Surveillance of Antimicrobial Resistance and the Quick Analysis of Antimicrobial Patterns and Trends (QAAPT) web application. Result: Urine had the highest percentage of positive cultures (47.5%, n=2009), followed by blood (35%, n=1500), wound swab/pus (10.1%, n=426) and sputum (5.3%, n=225). Among positive samples, E. coli was the most frequent isolate accounting for 37.19% (1574) of specimens, followed by Salmonella typhi (25.73%, n=1089), Klebsiella sp. (11.51%, n=487), Salmonella paratyphi A (6.38%, n=270), Staphylococcus aureus (4.21%, n=178), and Enterobacter sp. (3.59%, n=152). Overall, the Gram-negative isolates exhibited a high level of resistance to commonly used antibiotics such as amoxicillin/clavulanic acid, cefixime, and ceftriaxone. The resistance rate was lower in case of gentamicin, amikacin, and meropenem; however, Acinetobacter sp. showed a higher and alarming resistance rate against all antibiotics. Conclusion: This study exposes the antibiotic resistance patterns of bacterial isolates to routinely used antibiotics. The outcomes of this study will assist healthcare professionals in Bangladesh and the area in making informed decisions and providing better care to their patients. Therefore, resistance surveillance studies should be conducted to develop local antibiogram data, which will help to choose the best antibiotic for empirical therapy.