Staphylococcus Cassette Chromosome mec types among Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus isolates from Haryana, India

Methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) initially described as a major problem in hospitals have now been established to be a major threat in community as well all over the world. To track these infections, MRSA need to be further characterized by rapid, reliable and easily available methods. This study was conducted to determine the prevalence of SSC mec types among 250 S. aureus isolates obtained from various clinical specimens including pus, wound swabs, urine, catheters, blood, and CSF from both inpatient and outpatient departments of SGT Hospital, and Medical College Budhera, Gurgaon between April 2015 to May 2016. All the MRSA isolate were confirmed by phenotypic and genotypic methods and were further categorized into Hospital Associated (HA-MRSA-76) and Community Associated (CA-MRSA-11) based on the definition of Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). SSC mec typing was carried out on all 87 MRSA isolates and of these, 6 were of SSC mec type III, 39 were of type SSC mec IV and 36 were of type SSC mec V whereas 6 isolates were found to contain both type SSC mec IV & V. Among 11 HA-MRSA isolates, there were 6 SSC mec type III, 4 SSC mec type IV and 1SSCmec type V.