An outbreak of infections caused by extensively drug-resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae strains during a short period of time in a Chinese teaching hospital: epidemiology study and molecular characteristics

Abstract

In this study, we comprehensively described the clinical risk factors, outcome, epidemiology, and molecular basis associated with an outbreak of extensively drug-resistant KPC-2-producing Klebsiella pneumoniae involving 15 patients in a teaching hospital from May 1 to June 27, 2013. Most of the patients were elderly and received long-term hospital treatment, and 40.0% (6/15) of them were dead. All strains carried bla(KPC-2), rmtB, bla(CTX-M-65), bla(SHV-11), oqxA, oqxB, and aac(6')-Ib-cr and even harbored additional other resistance genes, such as armA, bla(CTX-M-1), bla(TEM-1). bla(KPC-2), rmtB, and bla(CTX-M-65) were located on the same ~54.2-kb plasmid, and conjugation experiments further proved the cotransferable characteristic. Alterations of outer membrane proteins were confirmed by sodium dodecyl sulfate--olyacrylamide gelelectrophoresis and sequencing, which can lead to a drastic change in the permeability of cells. All isolates belonged to the clone complex 258, spreading rapidly across the world. Our study demonstrated that a high degree of awareness and surveillance of those drug resistance determinants is urgently needed.

Keywords: 16S rRNA methylase; KPC-2; Klebsiella pneumoniae; ST11; Southern hybridization; XDR.