Isolation and antimicrobial susceptibility testing of Helicobacter pylori strains from gastric biopsies from Pakistani patients.

Helicobacter pylori is the etiological agent of gastritis and peptic ulcer. This importance had proposed antibiotics as a principle treatment of gastrointestinal pathologies. The focus of this research was to investigate the occurrence of H. pylori in patients having gastritis or gastric ulcer and also draw the susceptibility profile of isolates to several antibiotics. Blood and biopsy specimen from 96 acid peptic disease patients from both sexes were collected. Each sample was used for culture, gram staining, catalase, oxidase, urease and nitrate reduction test by conventional method. Serology using anti Helicobacter pylori IgG was done. The susceptibility profile to six common antibiotics was checked by E- test method. H. pylori was obtained from 40 patients (41.67%) with greater frequency in male (25%) than females (16.67%). With regards to age, H. pylori was recovered highest from the patients between 51-55 (75.86%) years of age. Tetracycline and rifampin were the most effective antibiotics in vitro, while metronidazole was less effective. Nine (22.5%) strains displayed resistance to at least one antimicrobial drug. Whereas, resistance to amoxicillin, ciprofloxacin, clarithromycin, metronidazole and combination of antibiotics like ciprofloxacin, clarithromycin and metronidazole, and ciprofloxin and metronidazole were 11.11, 55.56, 22.22, 33.33, 11.11 and 44.44% respectively. Lower susceptibility profile of H. pylori to antibiotics is because of frequent use of antibiotics to treat other infections.