The study addresses the hypothesis that antibiotic-resistant lung infections may result from the patient’s gut microbiome, and that some hospital treatments may cause pathogenic bacteria to multiply and move from the gut to the lungs.
To explore this hypothesis, a patient in intensive care was studied intensively for several weeks during his hospital stay.
During her hospital stay, the patient was treated for a urinary tract infection with the antibiotic meropenem, which was found to kill most of the Pseudomonas aeruginosa bacteria in her body. However, the most antibiotic-resistant strains remained, and antibiotic treatment actually stimulated the growth of these most pathogenic bacteria.
For several days, the researchers monitored the bacterium’s genomic development, watching it grow in the intestines and then progress to the lungs.
The researchers say this is the first direct evidence that antibiotic-resistant bacteria are crossing from the gut to the lungs.
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Source: Ferra
