PREVALENCE AND SUSCEPTIBILITY PATTERN OF E. COLI IN LOW BIRTH WEIGHT NEONATES OF EARLY ONSET SEPSIS

Neonatal sepsis is one of the commonest cause of neonatal mortality in the developing world which can be classified into early onset sepsis (EOS) which occurs in the first 7 days of life and late onset sepsis (LOS) which occurs ≥7 days of life. E. coli has been reported to be one of the significant and most common nosocomial pathogen which may cause septicemia, pneumonia and meningitis in the newborn. Most of the antibiotics which have been used extensively as life saving are rendered useless because of the emergence of resistant strains of bacterias. Therefore for determining the prevalence and antimicrobial susceptibility pattern of E. coli which is responsible for EOS and LOS and to establish the relationship with birth weight, a total of 229 blood samples were obtained from the neonates admitted to neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) who showed the clinical signs and symptoms of neonatal sepsis and sent for culture and sensitivity. Out of these 229, 102 showed the positive culture, among which early onset sepsis was found in 80 neonates while late onset sepsis was diagnosed in 22 neonates. The most frequent pathogen isolated from positive blood culture was E. coli (66.66%) and it was also the most common pathogen in low birth weight and preterm neonates of both early (59 cases- 57.84%) and late-onset (9 cases- 8.82%) sepsis and the incidence was found higher in early onset sepsis. The isolate was completely resistant to vancomycin and the resistance was higher for monotherapy of semi-synthetic penicillin group of antibiotics than their combination therapy with sulbactum. Imepenam and gatifloxacin showed the highest sensitivity (100%), followed by Piperacillin – tazobactum and ciprofloxacin, however the frequency of resistance was more common in low birth weight neonates of early onset sepsis