The frequency of pap and sfa genes among Escherichia coli strains isolated from hospitalized patients of Rouhani hospital in babol, Iran

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Escherichia coli urinary tract infections are known as one of the most important nosocomial infections. Adhesion genes such as sfa and pap which are important in bacterial attachment and colonization in epithelial cells have a significant role in bacterial pathogenecity. The aim of this study was to investigate the frequency of mentioned genes among E. coli strains isolated from hospitalized patients of Rouhani hospital in Babol city. METHODS: A total of 70 E. coli strains were isolated from urinary specimens of Rouhani hospitalized patients and then identified and confirmed with differential tests by using MacConkey agar, TSI, Oxidase test and etc. Thereafter, antimicrobial pattern were carried out by disk diffusion method. Finally the bacterial genomic DNA was extracted and the frequency of genes was determined by molecular method. FINDINGS: In this study resistance to Erythromycin (65.7%) and Trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole (57%) had the highest resistance ratio. On the other hand the frequency of sfa and pap genes was 60% and 27% respectively. CONCLUSION: The results of this study showed the sfa and pap genes have a high prevalence and antibiotic resistance also needs special attention.