Detection of Shiga Toxin Producing Escherichia coli from Human Faecal Samples by Multiplex PCR.

Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) infection occurs via the faecal-oral route and results in symptoms ranging from mild uncomplicated diarrhoea to severe bloody diarrhoea. It's complications can be fatal especially among patients with severe renal and neurological disorders. Resistance against different antibiotics by STEC is also a big concern now a days. Hence, present study was planned with a total of 220 human faecal samples (farm workers: cattle- 30, buffalo- 30, sheep- 20, goat-20, pig- 20, poultry- 50, and diarrheic patients attended to the hospital- 50) of different ages collected from different livestock farms in Proddatur, Andhra Pradesh and surrounding villages. Samples were subjected to isolation and identification of E. coli. The E. coli isolated were characterized by PCR as STEC using primers for two genes, i.e., stx1 and stx2. All the STEC isolates were subjected to ABST by using ten different antibiotic discs. Out of 220 human faecal samples, 216 (98.18%) were positive for E. coli by cultural method and 57.8% for STEC by PCR. On Muller-Hinton agar STEC isolates were highly resistant to ampicillin, cepahlothin (100% each) followed by tetracycline (98.4%), streptomycin (95.2%), sulphonamides (91.2%), trimethoprim (84.8%), kanamycin (36%), while highly sensitive to gentamicin (84.8%), followed by colistin (82.4%), chloromphenicol (62.4%), kanamycin (51.2%). The high prevalence of E. coli among farm animal workers further suggests the significant role of faeco-oral transmission as animals are the reservoir for this organism. By taking proper personal hygienic measures faeco-oral transmission can be minimized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]