Epidemiology and antimicrobial susceptibilities of 111 Campylobacter fetus subsp fetus strains isolated in Quebec, Canada, from 1983 to 2000

The epidemiology and antimicrobial susceptibilities of 111 Campylobacter fetus subsp. fetus strains isolated from 103 patients from 1983 to 2000 in Quebec, Canada, were determined. The median number of patients infected annually with this bacteria was seven, with an incidence of 0.1 per 100,000 population. The male-to-female ratio was 1.1 to 1.0. The patients originated from 13 of the 18 Quebec socioeconomic regions. The age range of the patients was 6 months to 90 years old, 53% being; greater than or equal to70 years old and 2% being <20 years old. The isolation site was blood for 69% of the patients, stools for 20%, and other body fluids for 11% of them. Three patients suffered a relapse, with the same strain being isolated from the same site at different times as confirmed by pulse-field gel electrophoresis. All isolates were susceptible to ampicillin, gentamicin, meropenem, and imipenem, with 90% minimal inhibitory concentrations of 4, 1, 0.12, and less than or equal to0.06 mug/ml, respectively. Three percent and two percent of the strains were, respectively, resistant and intermediate to ciprofloxacin. Thirty-four percent of the strains were resistant to tetracycline. There was a nonsignificant increase in resistance to ciprofloxacin (P = 0.27) and to tetracycline (P = 0.65) in recent years. The percentages of intermediate and resistant MICs were, respectively, 12 and 1% for cefotaxime and 71 and 0% for erythromycin. All strains were beta-lactamase negative.