Abstract:
Antibiotic resistance is associated with antibiotic abuse through self
medication. Antibiotic resistance is established through antimicrobic
susceptibility testing of isolated pathogens to the antibiotic of interest. Between
June and October 2008, 150 urine samples collected from patients referred to a
Clinical Laboratory in Accra Ghana for clinical laboratory tests were processed.
Positive and negative cultures were 60% and 40% respectively of all samples.
34.7% of patients had self medicated and 65.3% had not. 54.24% of the negative
cultures were from the self medicated subjects and 45.76% from non-self
medicated subjects. 78.02% of positive cultures were from non-self medicating
subjects while 21.98% were from self medicated subjects. E. coli, S. aureus and
Klebsiella pneumonia were isolated according to standard methods and their
sensitivities to Augmentin, Gentamycin, Imipenem and Amoxicillin antibiotics
determined by Kirby-Bauer disk diffusion method. K. pneumoniae was totally
resistant to Gentamycin, Augmentin and Amoxicillin; E. coli was totally resistant
to Amoxicillin and S. aureus totally sensitive to Imipenem. Generally, more
antibiotic self-medicating individuals had resistant pathogens than non selfmedicating individuals. The results confirm that antibiotic self medication prior to
clinically prescribed antibiotic treatment has a significant influence on the
response of bacteria to the clinically administered antibiotics.
