The present study identified 63 Klebsiella isolates among 100 different clinical specimens collected from patients in El-Mahalla Chest Hospital (approved by Research Ethics Committee, code: 36264PR205/5/23). Their frequency varied from 82.8% out of 64 sputum samples, 30.7% out of 26 urine samples and 20% out of 10 stool samples.
The antibiotic susceptibility test of the 63 Klebsiella isolates was tested against 18 commercial antibiotics, belonging to 8 groups, by the method of disk diffusion, confirming their resistance to different antibiotics between 15.8% (the least for Amikacin) and 100% (for ampicillin), with heterogeneous resistance patterns, hence a total of 16 patterns were detected among 63 tested isolates.
The genetic diversity between 20 resistant isolates that were selected by using Past program was done by Random amplification of polymorphic DNA (RAPD) finger-printing method, using 5 primers. The analysis showed that the isolate No. 40 from sputum was clearly differentiated from the remaining three different groups of other isolates. The majority of the tested Multidrug Resistant (MDR) isolates were found to have β- lactam antibiotics resistance genes that are plasmid in origin; therefore, the pathogenicity of Klebsiella isolates increased in the presence of virulence-associated plasmid.
The Susceptibility of Klebsiella isolates to 5 essential oil of cinnamon, clove, orange, lemon, and lemon grass was tested. Clove essential oil showed the best effect on bacterial growth with MIC of 1/20 v/v. The GC-MS and UV analyses showed that the phenolic compound eugenol was the most dominant compound in the clove essential oil.