Background: Klebsiella pneumoniae is globally responsible for hospital- and community-acquired infections, but the problem of antibiotic resistance is increasing making treatment difficult. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of K. pneumoniae and to establish the antibiotic resistance profile among clinical specimens at Jos University Teaching Hospital (JUTH) in Plateau State, Nigeria.

Methods: A total of 344 clinical samples were collected aseptically from in-patients with bacteremia (122 blood samples), soft tissue abscess (50 superficial wound swab) pneumonia (50 sputum samples) and UTI’s (122 urine samples). The samples were processed using standard microbiological methods for identification of K. pneumoniae. Samples were cultured on MacConkey agar and Cystine lactose electrolyte deficient agar. The resulting colonies of isolates were further sub cultured and Gram stained followed by biochemical test at Microbiology laboratory unit of Jos University Teaching Hospital. The antimicrobial susceptibility patterns were determined using Kirby-Bauer disc diffusion techniques.

Results: Following that, 39 (11.3%) K. pneumoniae isolates were obtained, where 23 (12.5%) and 16 (10.0%) were from males and females, respectively. The K. pneumoniae isolates were highly resistant to cefotaxime (94.9%), ceftazidime and cefepime (84.6%) but had low resistance for imipenem and meropenem (12.8% and 5.1%, respectively). 38 (97.4%) of the K. pneumoniae isolates were multidrug-resistant. PCR analysis confirmed 28 (93.3%) isolates to be Klebsiella using 16s rDNA having a product size of 1069bp.

Conclusion: The findings of this study show the prevalence of K. pneumoniae to be 11.3% and augmentin, imipenem, meropenem and ertapenem as the most effective antibiotics against the K. pneumoniae isolates. Antibiotic policies and regular surveillance of antibiotic susceptibility patterns may help to overcome the indiscriminate use of antibiotics which is a major cause of the emergence of drug resistance among pathogens.

Keywords: Klebsiella pneumoniae, PCR, Prevalence, Antibiotic-resistance, Kirby-Bauer.

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Ishaya Jesse

Department of Applied Biology, School of Applied Sciences, College of Science Technology, Kaduna Polytechnic, Tudun Wada, P.M.B. 2021, Kaduna, Nigeria