Pseudomonas aeruginosa from pet Chinese stripe-necked turtles (Ocadia sinensis) demonstrating antimicrobial and heavy metal resistance

Leading nosocomial pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa has increasingly been reported to be an opportunistic pathogen. In this study, a total of twenty P. aeruginosa isolates were isolated from 40 pet Chinese stripe-necked turtles and examined for their antimicrobial and heavy metal resistance properties. All isolates were multidrug resistance by scoring multiple antimicrobial resistance indices ≥0.2. In the disc distribution test, 100% resistance to ampicillin and oxacillin were detected. In addition to that, 14 (70%) isolate demonstrated amoxicillin resistance. Imipenem, fosfomycin, gentamycin, tobramycin and piperacillin resistance were detected in 40%, 15%, 20%, 10% and 5% of the isolates, respectively. The ESBLs gene that predominated in this study was blaSHV (55%), followed by blaTEM (50%), blaCTX (10%) and blaOXA (5%). The most frequent aminoglycoside resistance gene in this study was aac(6´)-Ib (40%). Class1 integron integrase gene intI1 and class 1 integron gene cassette gene aadA1 were detected in 45% and 35% of the isolates, respectively. All P. aeruginosa isolates demonstrated Cu and Cd resistance. CzcA and CopA genes were detected in 65% and 30% of the isolates, respectively. These findings reveal the presence of pet turtle-born P. aeruginosa can be a potential risk to public health and cannot be excluded as a non-nosocomial source of infections.