Nitrate Reductase Assay for Rapid Determination of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Clinical Isolates.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the performance of nitrate reductase assay (NRA), a rapid, colorimetric method for the determination of methicillin resistance in Staphylococcus aureus isolates obtained from the culture collection of the Akdeniz University Hospital Central Laboratory, Antalya, Türkiye. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Identification for all 290 S aureus isolates at the species level was performed via matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization-time of flight. Isolates were tested with NRA for methicillin resistance. The cefoxitin broth microdilution (BMD) method recommended by the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute was used as the reference method in the study. S aureus ATCC 29213 and S aureus ATCC 43300 strains were used for quality control. RESULTS: According to Food and Drug Administration criteria, the category agreement between NRA and BMD was found to be 100%. The essential agreement between both methods was determined to be 96.20%. There is no minor, major, or extremely major discrepancy between both methods. CONCLUSION: The results show that NRA is a rapid, practical, and reliable colorimetric method for detecting MRSA.

The effect of social movements on COVID-19 case increases and death in Turkey.

Objectives: This study aimed to determine whether there is a correlation between COVID-19 cases and deaths because of COVID-19 and community movements in Turkey and to develop a strategy for future outbreaks. Methods: The study's data covers COVID-19 cases and deaths between March 11, 2020, and December 16, 2021, and Turkey's Google community movements between these dates. The COVID-19 cases and deaths were obtained from Turkey's Ministry of Health COVID-19 Information Platform. Community mobility collated by Google is retail and recreation, supermarket and pharmacy, parks, public transport, workplaces visits, and residential. The data were transferred via "SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) for Windows 25.0 (SPSS Inc, Chicago, IL" and statistical analysis was performed. The Spearman correlation test was used as a statistical method. In the Kruskal-Wallis Test, categorical variables were created using increases and decreases in community movements based on the baseline. Results: A weak positive correlation between daily COVID-19 deaths and supermarket and pharmacy activity (r = 0.28 p < 0.01). A weak negative correlation with park activity (r = -0.23 p < 0.01). A weakly positive and significant relationship with workplace visits mobility (r = 0.10 p < 0.05). There was a weak positive significant relationship with public transport mobility (r = 0.10 p < 0.01), including a weak positive significant relationship with residential (r = 0.12 p < 0.01). Conclusions: Social distancing measures (such as reducing community mobility) and educating people on viral transmission in possible epidemics will save us time developing new diagnostic tests and vaccine studies.

Tuberculosis and beta-lactam antibiotics.

Tuberculosis (TB) is one of the oldest health problems in the world and it remains unresolved. Multidrug-resistant-TB and extensively resistant-TB are a serious problem for control programs. The evaluation of available antibiotics has gained importance in recent years for the treatment of resistant TB. Beta-lactam antibiotics inhibit cell wall biosynthesis in the bacteria; the presence of beta-lactamase enzyme in TB bacilli raises the question of whether this group of antibiotics can be used in treatment. As a result, it has been reported that the combination of beta-lactam antibiotics with beta-lactamase is effective against Mycobacterium tuberculosis both in vitro and in vivo. The aim of this article is to review and discuss up-to-date knowledge and future perspective on beta-lactam antibiotics and TB.