The prevalence and antibiotics susceptibility patterns of Corynebacterium minutissimum isolates from Tabriz, Iran

Abstract

Erythrasma is a chronic infection of the skin that appears in the body folds as flat copper spots. The causative agent of this infection is Corynebacterium minutissimum (C. minutissi-mum). The aim of this study was to investigate the frequency and antibiotics susceptibility pat-terns of, and the presence of the erythromycin resistance gene (ermX and mefA) in C. minutis-simum isolates from Tabriz, Iran. Methods: From July 2020 to May 2022, 278 skin scrub specimens were collected from patients admitted to hospitals of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences. Specimens were inoculated on the blood agar plates and isolates were identified by microbiological laboratory standards. The antibiotic susceptibility patterns were determined by the disk diffusion method and resistance genes of ermX and mefA were detected by the PCR method. Results: Out of 278 specimens, 41 C. minutissimum isolates (14.74%) were recovered. The highest frequency of resistance was observed to penicillin (75.6%) followed by clindamycin (29.26 %), erythromycin and clarithromycin (39.02%), tetracycline (24.2%), gentamicin and neomycin (19.51%). The frequency of ermX and mefA genes were 75% and 12.5%, respective-ly.