Detection of Bacterial Contamination and Antibiotic Resistance at Neonate Intensive Care Units in Ibn Al-Atheer Teaching Hospital for Children

The study included the isolation and diagnosis of some Gram positive and Gram negative bacterial species from the Neonate Intensive Care Unit in Ibn Al-Atheer Teaching hospital for children from August 2019 to February 2020.A total of 90 swabs were obtained from various sites of the ICU from Ibn Al-Atheer hospital environment. The swabs were inoculated on culture media including blood agar, mannitol salt agar and MacConkey agar. The growth showed different bacterial colonies which had been tested for their morphological and biochemical characteristics. 80 pure isolates, 76 of them were Gram positive bacteria, and 4 isolates were Gram negative bacteria. The highest rate of bacterial contamination was found in the couch and the incubator sites. The most prevalent bacteria isolated from inanimate surfaces were Staphylococcus aureus, coagulase negative staphylococci, Bacillus spp. in addition to Diphtheroids, Lactobacillus spp. Streptococcus pneumoniae, Klebsiella pneumoniae, and E, coli. Antibiotic susceptibility testing for all isolates was performed using 8 types of commonly used antibiotics in NICU. Taken all together, Gram positive and Gram negative bacteria showed high resistance against streptomycin, erythromycin, and ampicillin respectively. Notably, resistance to ampicillin and gentamicin were commonly demonstrated to be given as the first line of treatment in NICUs.