Detection and Resistance Pattern of Staphylococcus aureus Causing Blood Stream Infections Among ICU Patients

Bacteremia is a serious condition for hospitalized patients and delays in treatment can increase length of stay, hospital costs, and mortality rate, as it can trigger more serious events such as septic shock, occasionally with multiple organ failure, and death (1). With regard to the fact that bacteremia is the complication of a critical illness, it occurs in approximately 5% of all patients admitted to ICUs owing to the paucity of new antimicrobials in the industry pipeline, and the emergence of strains resistant to recent antimicrobials (2). The prevalence of multidrug resistant microorganisms is constantly growing, despite various strategies for their prevention, and this is a concern for health professionals. One of the common bacterial pathogens present in the bloodstream infections (BSIs) in our region is Staphylococcus aureus (3,4). Overcoming methicillin resistant S. aureus (MRSA) infections is an obstacle due to the resistance to beta-lactam antibiotics. Considering the increasing rate of infections caused by MRSA, doing a reliable, accurate, and rapid test for detection of MRSA is essential for both antibiotic therapy and infection control measures. The present study aimed to determine BSI caused by S. aureus at a large teaching referral hospital in Karaj, Iran. This hospital-based study was carried out in the Microbiology Department of a hospital in Karaj, Iran, from December 2016 to September 2017. During the study, a total of 1500 patients, clinically suspected of BSI, were enrolled.