Identification of Brucella species isolated from proven brucellosis patients in Izmir, Turkey

In many parts of the world, brucellosis has significantly decreased, but it is still a problem in some regions of Turkey. Totally, 11 Brucella strains isolated from the blood cultures of patients with presumptive diagnosis of brucellosis were identified to species and biovar level. For species identification, (i) CO2 requirements of isolates; (ii) detection of urease activation; (iii) detection of H2S production; (iv) dye sensitivities (thionine and basic fuchsin); (v) susceptibility to Brucella phage and (vi) agglutination with monospecific antisera (A and M) were performed. Ten out of 11 isolates were identified as B. melitensis biovar 3 and one out of 11 were identified as B. melitensis biovar 1. The sensitivity of isolates to antibiotics was determined by the E-test. All isolates were found to be sensitive to doxycycline, rifampin, ciprofloxacin and cephtriaxone. Only one out of 11 isolates was found to be semi-sensitive to trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole (cotrimoxazole).