Antibiotic Resistance Patterns of Staphylococcus aureus Isolated from Mobile Phone Devices in Bangladesh

A total of 38 Staphylococcus aureus were isolated from mobile phone devices used by ready-to-eat food seller, diagnostic laboratory technician and day-care centre staff. To reveal the antibiotic resistance profile, the isolates were subjected to antibiogram study against nine antibiotics. The study revealed that 68.42% of the S. aureus isolates were resistant to at least one of the antibiotics tested. The prevalence of penicillin resistant S. aureus was relatively high (60.53%) in this study. Among the isolates, 23.68% exhibited resistance to cloxacillin, 21.05% to rifampicin, 18.42% to amoxicillin, 5.26% to tetracycline and chloramphenicol and 2.63% to vancomycin but none of the isolates showed resistance to gentamicin. The isolates displayed 13 patterns of antibiotic resistance. Among the isolates, 23.68% were found resistant to three or more antibiotics and considered as multi-drug resistant. One of the isolates demonstrated resistance to five antibiotics including vancomycin. Findings of this study revealed that mobile phone devices used by the members of these occupational groups may serve as a reservoir of antibiotic-resistant S. aureus. Personnel involved in food preparation, handling of pathological samples or work with infants and children must exercise good hygienic practices in their respective workplace to prevent the dissemination of antibiotic-resistant bacteria via their mobile phone devices. The findings of this study emphasizes on the need for antibiotic susceptibility testing before prescribing antibiotics to control infections caused by S. aureus.