BACTERIA ISOLATES AND ANTIBIOTIC SUSCEPTIBILITY OF EAR INFECTIONS AMONG CHILDREN IN GONDAR, ETHIOPIA

Abstract

Ear infections are of different types with Otitis media being the most common, occurring mostly in children. It has been shown that with the development and widespread use of antimicrobial drugs, the types of the pathogenic organism and their antibiotic sensitivity have changed over time, making continuous and periodic surveillance necessarily in guiding appropriate antimicrobial therapy This study designed to identify the commonest bacterial agents and their antibiotic susceptibility pattern from children with discharging ear at University of Gondar Teaching Hospital. Between January 2011 and May 2012, 120 children with ear discharge were investigated. Ear discharge specimens were collected aseptically and cultured. Antibiotic susceptibility was performed for the isolates. Data entry and analysis was done using SPSS version computer 16 software. Comparisons were made using Chi-square test with Fisher exact tests. A p-value of <0.05 was considered indicative of a statistically significant difference. Of the 120 patients with ear discharge, 56.7% were males and 43.3% were females (p>0.05) resulting an overall male to female ratio of 1:1.3. A total of 116 bacteria were obtained from 108 culture positive ear discharges. Staphylococcus aureus accounted for 30.2% of the total isolate followed by Pseudomonas aeruginosa(25.9%) and proteus mirabilis (12.1%). Both gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria isolated from ear discharge showed low level of resistance to most (60%) of anti microbial agents tested. In general ceftriaxone, ciprofloxacin, norfloxacine and gentamicin were the most effective drugs against the tested gram positive and gram negative bacteria. High bacteria isolation rate of 90% was observed among children having ear discharges. The gram negative bacteria were the predominant in prevalence compared to the gram positive bacteria. Ceftriaxone, ciprofloxacin, norfloxacine and gentamicin were the most effective drugs.