Rapid, reagent-free technology for identification of methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) in clinical microbiology labs

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Infections caused by antibiotic-resistant bacteria are a major concern in hospitals worldwide. Staphylococcal and enterococcal bacteria are major causes of hospital-acquired infections, including half of all bloodstream infections. Canadian prevalence studies have estimated that approximately 4% of hospitalized patients will become infected or colonized with MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus), and the prevalence of infections caused by vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) in Canadian hospitals tripled between 2007 and 2013. One of the recommendations in the action plan on antimicrobial resistance put forward by the Federal government in 2015 is research and development of faster and more accurate diagnostic tools that can provide doctors the information they need to accurately diagnose an infection, thereby promoting effective use of antimicrobials. This NSERC-I2I Phase I proposal aims at achieving these goals by developing a new rapid and cost-effective technology for the identification of MRSA and VRE based on "whole-organism fingerprinting" by attenuated total reflectance-Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopy. The advantages of the new technology include: (i) minimal sample preparation, (ii) reagent-free analysis, (iii) simple (one-step) protocol, (iv) fast turnaround time (1-2 min), and (v) low cost per test. To our knowledge, there is no other technology currently on the market that accomplishes the discrimination between antibiotic-resistant and antibiotic-susceptible bacteria in a single step without the use of any reagents.