[Current status of resistance of bacteria to pefloxacin in hospital units. Cross resistance with ofloxacin and ciprofloxacin. Results of a multicenter study].

The antibacterial activities of pefloxacin (PEF), ofloxacin (OFL), ciprofloxacin (CIP) were measured by agar diffusion (5 micrograms strength disks) against 6370 non duplicate clinical isolates collected in November 1991 in 40 hospitals from various areas in France. The MICs of PEF, OFL and CIP were determined by agar dilution against intermediate or resistant strains to one of the three antibiotics (inhibition zone < 16 mm for PEF, OFL, < 19 mm for CIP). In the Enterobacteriaceae the overall incidence of resistance to PEF (MIC > 4 mg/l) was 8% with important variations between the different species: E. coli 2%, Salmonella 0%, E. cloacae 9%, K. pneumoniae 21%, P. mirabilis 13%, P. vulgaris 3%, M. morganii 5%, Providencia 61%, S. marcescens 55%. Among S. aureus, the incidence of resistance was 3% for the methicillin-susceptible strains and 86% for the methicillin-resistant strains. The same applied to coagulase negative Staphylococci: methicillin-susceptible 9%, methicillin-resistant 62%. The frequency of the resistant strains was high among P. aeruginosa: 40% and A. baumanii: 83%. A high degree of correlation was observed between the MICs of PEF, OFL and CIP for all the bacterial species: r = 0.8 - 0.9. No major discrepancies were noted between the clinical categorizations of the activities of the three antibiotics for the different species except for P. aeruginosa: 4% of the strains were resistant to pefloxacin and susceptible to ciprofloxacin.