Abstract

Introduction: Nowadays antibiotic resistance is one of the problems faced by all countries. Last year, the World Health Organization mentioned that pneumococcus and meningitis are the most common causes of respiratory tract infections, thus, this study aimed to evaluate the antibiotic resistant pneumococcal disease. Methods: In this study, the prevalence of antibiotic-resistant Streptococcus pneumoniae was studied by culturing infections in patients admitted to Shohada Ashayer hospital clinic from winter, 2002 to spring, 2003. Patients with upper and lower respiratory tract infections were studied through the examination of their sputum specimens obtained from throat swabs, and in the biphasic phase, the samples were placed and transported to the laboratory after the initial culture in specific chocolate agar medium. Pneumococcal susceptibility reaction chemistry was used by in vitro disk diffusion method in antibiotics medium. Results: From 125 patients’ cultures with respiratory infections, 34 patients (27.2%) were positive for pneumococci, of whom 60% were men with an average of 21.13, and 40% were women with an average of 35.22. The results of antibiogram by disk diffusion method was performed on antibiotics resistance rates of pneumococcal sensitivity as follows: the highest resistance to antibiotics was found for ceftizoxime with 100%, the lowest resistance for nitrofurantoin with 6.45 %, the highest sensitivity to antibiotics for nitrofurantoin with 93.54%, and the lowest sensitivity for ampicillin with 3.3%. Conclusion: An increase in pneumococcal resistance to most antibiotics may be necessary, so the primary and secondary prevention measures are to set a guideline to be approved in a country for the rational use of antibiotics.