Prevalence and antimicrobial susceptibility pattern of Salmonella and Shigella among food handlers in catering establishments at Debre Markos University, Northwest Ethiopia.

BACKGROUND: Food-borne diseases are a major health problem in developing countries including Ethiopia. This study determined the prevalence and antibiotic susceptibility patterns of Shigella and Salmonella among food handlers working in student and staff food service establishments at Debre Markos University.

METHODS: A laboratory-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 220 food handlers from January 2015 to June 2016. Stool and fingernail samples from the subjects were cultured on bacteriological culture medium, and Shigella and Salmonella were isolated and identified following standard procedures. Antimicrobial susceptibility testing was performed for all isolates using the Kirby-Bauer disk diffusion method.

RESULTS: The overall prevalence of Shigella and Salmonella in this study was 5.9%, with 3.6% of stool specimens testing positive for Salmonella species and 2.3% testing positive for Shigella species. None of the food handlers had positive cultures for Shigella or Salmonella in respect of their fingernail specimens. The isolation of either Shigella or Salmonella had a significant inverse relationship with the number of service years (p=0.017). All isolates of Shigella and Salmonella were 100% susceptible to ciprofloxacin, norfloxacin, and gentamicin. However, all isolated pathogens were resistant to ampicillin (100%).

CONCLUSIONS: The findings of this study highlight the importance of food handlers in the transmission of pathogens to the customers (students and the general population). Screening of food handlers, training for food handling and hand hygiene practices, and regular monitoring of the food handling practices should be done in order to avoid diseases that can be acquired through improper food handling, like bacterial infections.