An-Najah Staff

The present study was initiated to assess and evaluate antimicrobial resistance in one hundred eighteen isolates of Shiga toxigenic Escherichia coli STEC O157 obtained from Northern Palestine. Eighty-three percent of isolates were resistant to ampicillin, followed by 59% to norfloxacin, 58% to tetracycline, 55% to gentamicin, 50% to chloramphinicol, 48% to amikacin, 40% to co-trimoxazole, and 25% to ceftazidime. Multidrug resistance was seen in more than two-third of the isolates (68%), and there was no common resistance pattern among the isolates. Our findings suggest that use of antimicrobials, including tetracycline derivatives, sulfa drugs, aminoglycosides, and penicillins, has selected for multiple antimicrobial resistance phenotypes in STEC O157.