Bacterial Contamination and Resistance to Commonly Used Antimicrobials of Healthcare Workersʹ Mobile Phones in Teaching Hospitals, Kerman, Iran

Problem Statement: The contamination rates of Health Care Workerʹs (HCW) mobile phones and resistance to commonly used antimicrobials were evaluated in three teaching hospitals in Kerman, Iran. So, we examined 150 randomly selected HCWs in three teaching hospitals in Kerman, Iran, 2007. For each HCW a sterile swab moistened with sterile water was rotated over the surface of both sides of his/her phone, a second swab for the sampling of the dominant hand. Both swabs were cultured by the routine methodology in use at laboratory. Plates were incubated aerobically at 37°C for 48 h. Approach: All samples were examined for the antimicrobial activity for commonly used antimicrobials using disc diffusion method. Results: A total of 48 (32.0%, CI95 24.6-40.1%) mobile phones and 59 (39.3%, CI95 31.5-47.6%) of dominant hands had bacterial contamination and Staphylococcus epidermidis was the most commonly cultured organisms from all sites. The resistance rates to commonly used antimicrobials in isolated bacteria from phones and dominant hand varied from 6.7% for cephalothin to 25% for amoxicillin, respectively. Conclusions/Recommendations: The kind of isolated microorganisms and their susceptibility to commonly used antimicrobials from dominant hands were almost similar with those from phones (p<0.05). In conclusion, the results indicated that the rate of bacterial contamination of the HCWʹs phone is just below 50%, accompanying with a resistance rate to the common used antibiotics in one fourth of all the cases. Therefore, mobile phones could be an important source of nosocomial infections and the spread of bacterial resistance bacteria in medical healthcare settings.