SURVEY OF ANAEROBIC SUSCEPTIBILITY PATTER NS - A FRENCH MULTICENTRIC STUDY

During 1992, the in vitro antibiotic susceptibility of 462 anaerobic b acteria was performed in 7 hospitals, by the reference agar dilution m ethod. Among the 222 Bacteroides fragilis group strains, only one Bact eroides fragilis strain was resistant to imipenem and all betalactams, even combined with betalactamase-inhibitors while metronidazole resis tance could not be detected. One major outer membrane protein (probabl y a porin) was lacking in some of the six amoxicillin-clavulanic acid resistant Bacteroides fragilis group strains. Evolution in antibiotic resistance rates could be assessed only for clindamycin and piperacill in whose resistance rates increased to 14 and 15.8 p. cent, respective ly. On the whole anaerobic strains resistance rates were : imipenem 0. 2, ticarcillin-clavulanic acid 0.5, amoxicillin-clavulanic acid or met ronidazole 1.5, piperacillin 9.1, cefotaxime-sulbactam 9.7, cefoxitin 12.8, clindamycin 13.7, cefotaxime 27.2, amoxicillin 45 and ciprofloxa cin 70, respectively.