Rapid Antibiotics Screening Method for Actinobacillus actinomycetemcomitans Using Oxygen Electrode System

Abstract

Antibiotic treatments for clinical periodontal fields have been in need of rapid antibiotic susceptibility test. However, it takes long time and high cost to perform drug susceptibility tests for pathogenic bacteria from clinical samples. In this report, we have examined the applicability of a totaly new oxygen electrode system for rapid drug susceptibility test (DOX-10) to a periodontal bacterium, which measures dissolved oxygen content in culture media. This system stands on the hypothesis that oxgen consumption will decrease if the bacteria is susceptible to an antibiotic. A facultative anaerobic bacterium, Actinobacillus actinomycetemcomitans-Y 4 (ATCC 43718 serotype b; A. a.) was aerobically used in the experiment at a concentration of 1×108 cells/m/ for each channels. The dissolved oxygen content in a channel gradually decreased for 1 hour measurement. Antibiotics effective to A. a., tetracycline and minomycine, reduced the decrease of the dissolved oxygen content in a channel indicating that oxygen consumption by the bacteria was diminished, but the other antibiotics ineffective to A. a., bacitracin and vancomycin, did not. These results indicate that this system has a high feasibility for the application of drug treatment in periodontal fields. J. Jpn. Soc. Periodontol., 41: 201-209, 1999.