Increased Isolation and Characterization of Shigella sonnei Obtained from Hospitalized Children in Tehran, Iran

• Published in: Journal of health, population and nutrition Vol. 26; no. 4; pp. 426 - 430
• Main Authors: Ranjbar, Reza, Dallal, Mohammad M. Soltan, Talebi, Malihe, Pourshafie, Mohammad R.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Bangladesh ICDDR,B: Centre for Health and Population Research 01-12-2008; BioMed Central Ltd; BioMed Central; International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh
• Subjects: Antibiotic resistance; Antibiotics; Bacillary dysentery; Causes of; Child; Children; Children & youth; Diarrhea; Dosage and administration; Drug resistance; Drug resistance in microorganisms; Drug Resistance, Bacterial; Drug therapy; Dysentery, Bacillary - epidemiology; Dysentery, Bacillary - microbiology; Electrophoresis, Agar Gel - methods; Enzymes; Health aspects; Hospitalization; Hospitalized; Hospitals; Humans; Identification and classification; Iran; Iran - epidemiology; Isolation; Microbial Sensitivity Tests; Microbiology; Original Papers; Plasmids; Ribotyping; Ribotyping - methods; Shigella; Shigella flexneri; Shigella sonnei; Shigella sonnei - isolation & purification; Shigellosis; Statistics; Tehran; Iran; Teheran Iran
• ISSN: 1606-0997; 2072-1315

Shigella flexneri has been the most frequent cause of shigellosis in children in Iran. To evaluate the changes in frequency of serogroups, 302 Shigella species were isolated in 2003 from hospitalized children, aged less than 12 years, with acute diarrhoea in Tehran, Iran. The number of collected S. sonnei, S. flexneri, S. boydii, and S. dysenteriae isolates was 178 (58.9%), 110 (37.4%), 10 (3.3%), and 4 (1.3%) respectively. Most (94%) S. sonnei isolates were resistant to co-trimoxazole. They were, however, relatively or completely sensitive to 15 commonly-used antibiotics. The extracted plasmids showed 12 different profiles with two closely-related patterns constituting 70% of the total isolates. Ribotyping, using PvuII, HindIII or SalI restriction enzymes, generated a single pattern for all S. sonnei isolates. Data suggest that S. sonnei has become the predominant serogroup in children in the hospitals of Tehran.