Posted: November 30th, 2010 - 8:43pm
Source: Journal of Food Safety

ABSTRACT
This work aimed to evaluate the microbiological conditions of enteral feeding, water, powder module and personnel samples obtained from two public hospitals in Goiânia/GO, Brazil. The Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus strains isolated were submitted to antibiogram for phenotypic characterization. The S. aureus strains isolated were grouped into six phenotypic profiles (A–F). There was no correlation among strains isolated from diet and handlers samples. The E. coli strains were grouped into four phenotypic profiles (A–D). The E. coli phenotypes A and C showed the same susceptibility profile for microorganisms isolated from handlers and diets, suggesting a relationship among those isolates. Seven S. aureus and 12 E. coli isolates were resistant to two or more antibiotics. The diets presented unsatisfactory sanitary-hygienic conditions in the hospitals evaluated because 47 samples (58.8%) from the first hospital and 30 samples (37.5%) from the second hospital were above the limits established by Brazilian legislation.
PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS
Enteral nutrition is a very important mechanism to provide support to health-compromised patients, so the microbiological quality of this product is essential to guarantee its safety. This study emphasizes the importance of monitoring the enteral diet microbiological quality and the factors associated with its contamination. The study highlights the use of antibiogram as an instrument to correlate strains in order to help the identification of the probable origin of final product contamination.