Multiple NDM-5-Expressing Escherichia Coli Isolates From an Immunocompromised Pediatric Host

Tim Flerlage; Jessica N Brazelton de Cardenas; Cherilyn D Garner; Nur A Hasan; Hiren Karathia; Amr Qudeimat; Gabriela Maron; Randall Hayden

doi:10.1093/ofid/ofaa018

Multiple NDM-5-Expressing Escherichia Coli Isolates From an Immunocompromised Pediatric Host

Open Forum Infect Dis. 2020 Jan 12;7(2):ofaa018. doi: 10.1093/ofid/ofaa018. eCollection 2020 Feb.

Authors

Tim Flerlage^{1

2}, Jessica N Brazelton de Cardenas³, Cherilyn D Garner³, Nur A Hasan⁴, Hiren Karathia⁴, Amr Qudeimat⁵, Gabriela Maron², Randall Hayden³

Affiliations

¹ Division of Pediatric Critical Care Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, Tennessee, USA.
² Department of Infectious Diseases, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee, USA.
³ Department of Pathology, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee, USA.
⁴ CosmosID Incorporated, Rockville, Maryland, USA.
⁵ Department of Bone Marrow Transplant and Cellular Therapy, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee, USA.

Abstract

Background: Genes conferring carbapenem resistance have disseminated worldwide among Gram-negative bacteria. Here we present longitudinal changes in clinically obtained Escherichia coli isolates from 1 immunocompromised pediatric patient. This report demonstrates potential for antibiotic resistance genes and plasmids to emerge over time in clinical isolates from patients receiving intensive anticancer chemotherapy and broad-spectrum antibiotics.

Methods: Thirty-three isolates obtained over 7 months from 1 patient were included. Clinical data were abstracted from the medical record. For each isolate, studies included phenotypic antibacterial resistance patterns, sequence typing, bacterial isolate sequencing, plasmid identification, and antibiotic resistance gene identification.

Results: Sites of isolation included blood, wound culture, and culture for surveillance purposes from the perianal area. Isolates were of 5 sequence types (STs). All were resistant to multiple classes of antibiotics; 23 (69.6%) were phenotypically resistant to all carbapenems. The blaNDM-5 gene was identified in 22 (67%) isolates, all of ST-167 and ST-940, and appeared to coincide with the presence of the IncFII and IncX3 plasmid.

Conclusions: We present unique microbiologic data from 33 multidrug-resistant E. coli isolates obtained over the course of 7 months from an individual patient in the United States. Two E. coli sequence types causing invasive infection in the same patient and harboring the blaNDM-5 gene, encoded on the IncX3 plasmid and the IncFII plasmid, were identified. This study highlights the emergence of multidrug-resistant bacteria on antibiotic therapy and the necessity of adequate neutrophil number and function in the clearance of bacteremia.

Keywords: NDM-5; immunocompromised; multidrug-resistant; pediatric.