SENSITIVITY OF ERYTHROMYCIN AGAINST CORYNEBACTERIUM DIPHTHERIAE

Diphtheria is an acute infection disease caused by Corynebacterium diphtheria e . It remains a problem in Indonesia in a recent several years especially in East Java Province, which suffered from an outbreak of diphtheria in 201 1 . Erythromycin is the second line antibiotics therapy for diphteria if the patient is allergic to penicillin, also serving as a prophylactic and carrier therapy for contact diphtheria. Erythromycin has been used for diphtheria fo r a very long time, but there is little recent data on its sensitivity  against C. diphtheriae. The purpose of this study is to identify whether Erythromycin still has a strong antibacterial activity against Corynebacterium diphtheriae by invitro test . This was a descriptive study which observed the sensitivity pattern of erythromycin against Corynebacterium diphtheria e using the E psilometer test (etest) as a diffusion technique . Samples used in this study were 30 isolate s of toxigenic Corynebacterium diphtheriae strain mitis and gravis at the Center for Health Laboratory (BBLK) Surabaya obtained during 2011 until 2014. We retrieved the data based on gender , age, and districts of patients for each of the samples then analyzed them descriptively. In this study , a sensitivity test of 30 toxigenic Corynebacterium diphtheriae isolate s revealed that 27 (90%) were sensitive to Erythromycin (average Minimum Inhibitory Concentration/ MIC) <0.016 μg/mL and all were strain mitis, while 3 (10%) had intermedi a t e sensitivity with MIC 1 μg/mL (all were strain gravis). No resistance result was found from the sensitivity test. According to the result, we conclude that Erythromycin still has a strong antibacterial activity against Corynebacterium diphtheriae.