Prevalence and antimicrobial resistance pattern of Burkholderia cepacia at a tertiary care teaching hospital

Background Burkholderia cepacia (B. cepacia) is the fourth most common pathogenic non-fermenting gram-negative bacilli isolated from clinical samples in hospitalized patients. It is an emerging opportunistic pathogen causing a wide range of infections in immunocompromised and hospitalized patients. Methods We did a retrospective observational study at Shree Krishna Hospital, Karamsad after approval by the Institutional Ethics Committee to determine the prevalence and antimicrobial resistance pattern of B. cepacia from January 2015 to November 2020. Clinical specimens of all the indoor and outdoor patients of all age groups, from whom B. cepacia was isolated, were included in the study. Identification and antimicrobial susceptibility testing of isolates were done by the Vitek 2 Compact system as per the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) guidelines. Results Ninety-one (0.54%) B. cepacia were isolated out of 16 840 organisms from 45 743 specimens received during the duration of the study. These were isolated most commonly from patients in the 0-20 years age group (31%) followed by those 41-60 years of age (20%). Also it was isolated more often in males than females. Blood and body fluids (57%) were the most common specimens from which B. cepacia was isolated followed by respiratory specimens (18%), urine (14%), and pus (11%). B. cepacia antimicrobial resistance was seen more commonly to ticarcillin-clavulanate (72%) followed by levofloxacin (34%), trimethoprim- sulphamethoxazole (30%), ceftazidime (30%), minocycline (21%) and meropenem (14%). Conclusion The prevalence of B. cepacia was low. B. cepacia has been identified as an important pathogen in bloodstream infections. It is important to know the antimicrobial resistance pattern of B. cepacia for better management of patients.