Isolation, identification of bacteria associated with mobile phones and their antibiotic susceptibility Chitturi Ch. M. Kumari1,*, Lakshmi P. Jeevana2 1Associate Professor, Department of Applied Microbiology, School of Engineering and Technology, Sri Padmavati Mahila Visvavidyalayam (Women's University), Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh, India 2Assistant Professor, Department of Basic Sciences and Humanities, School of Engineering and Technology, Sri Padmavati Mahila Visvavidyalayam (Women's University), Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh, India *Corresponding Author: Dr. Ch. M. Kumari Chitturi Associate Professor, Department of Applied Microbiology, Sri Padmavati Mahila Visvavidyalayam, Tirupati-517502, A.P., India Mobile: 9160091739, Email: chandi2222002@yahoo.co.in
Online published on 25 September, 2018. Abstract Mobile phones, due to their nature and proximity to sensitive part of our bodies in usage such as faces, ears, lips and hands of users which could become veritable reservoirs of pathogens that could result in infections. The present study was carried out to isolate and identify bacteria associated with mobile cell phones in a Hospital environment. Bacterial load and the susceptibility pattern of the isolated bacteria checked with some commonly-used antibiotics. A total of ten (10) mobile phones were randomly sampled and divided in to two groups, Group I from Hospital Care Workers (HCW) and Five from patients (Group II) at SvRR Government hospital, Tirupati. For each mobile phone, two sterile swabs moistened with normal saline were rotated over the surface of both sides of the mobile phone and soaked in 10 ml sterile peptone broth. Enumeration of the bacterial counts was carried out using pour plate technique and all 10 mobile phones sampled were contaminated with varied number of bacteria. The range of number was 2–5 × 107 CFU/phone for total bacterial flora from Group I and number varied to Group II was less when compared to Group I (1–2×107 CFU/ml) identified using cultural, morphological and biochemical techniques. The present work revealed that the majority of isolated bacterial contaminants were mixed with more than one organism. A total of 14 bacterial strains were isolated from all collected samples. The isolated microorganisms from mobile phones of two groups were similar. Among these 14 strains one spherical bacterium and two types of rods (03 strains) were picked from bacterial colonies and were subjected to biochemical characterization. The rate of bacterial contamination of mobile phones was 100%. The highest rate of contamination of personal mobile phone was recorded in patients (75%) and the lowest was recorded in HCW members (25%). 2 isolates belonging to genera: Staphylococcus sps. and Pseudomonas sps. were identified. Antibiotic susceptibility testing of the isolates indicated that Staphylococcus sps. had susceptibility against colitrine and cefodoxime while Pseudomonas sps against colitrine and piperacillin. The identified bacteria have pathogenic potential and their presence on the cell phones surfaces could serve as a source of cross-transmission of bacterial infections in hospital environment. Top Keywords Contamination, Cell phones, Nosocomial pathogens, patients, Hospital care workers(HCW), . Top |