Identification and Characterization of a Vancomycin Intermediate-Resistant Staphylococcus haemolyticus Isolated from Guangzhou, China

Wanyang Dong; Qi Peng; Xiaohua Tang; Tian Zhong; Shunan Lin; Ziling Zhi; Jingyi Ye; Bixia Yang; Ning Sun; Wenchang Yuan

doi:10.2147/IDR.S411860

Identification and Characterization of a Vancomycin Intermediate-Resistant Staphylococcus haemolyticus Isolated from Guangzhou, China

Infect Drug Resist. 2023 Jun 8:16:3639-3647. doi: 10.2147/IDR.S411860. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Wanyang Dong^#¹, Qi Peng^#¹, Xiaohua Tang^#^{1

2}, Tian Zhong¹, Shunan Lin¹, Ziling Zhi¹, Jingyi Ye¹, Bixia Yang¹, Ning Sun^{1

3}, Wenchang Yuan¹

Affiliations

¹ Guangzhou Key Laboratory for Clinical Rapid Diagnosis and Early Warning of Infectious Diseases, KingMed School of Laboratory Medicine, Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou, 510180, People's Republic of China.
² Third Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University, Department of Clinical Laboratory, Guangzhou, 510150, People's Republic of China.
³ Guangzhou First People's Hospital, School of Medicine, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, 510180, People's Republic of China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Background: Staphylococcus haemolyticus is an opportunistic pathogen that belongs to coagulase-negative Staphylococci (CoNS). Increasing infection and multi-drug resistance cases caused by this strain have been reported and thus it poses a great health threat.

Methods: The third-generation sequencing technology was performed on a S. haemolyticus SH-1 isolated from a clinical sample to analyze the drug resistance genes, which included vancomycin resistance related genes. In addition, antimicrobial susceptibility tests, transmission electron microscopy and Triton X-100 stimulated autolysis were conducted to understand its biological characteristics.

Results: The study shows that this clinical isolate is a vancomycin intermediate-resistant strain. Genome comparison also revealed that WalK(N70K) and WalK(R280Q) mutations may contribute to the vancomycin resistant phenotype. Besides, S. haemolyticus SH-1 exhibit common features of thicker cell wall and decreased autolytic activity.

Conclusion: S. haemolyticus SH-1 with WalKR mutations shows typical characteristics of vancomycin resistant strains. Combining the genome features and biological properties, our findings may provide important information for the understanding of the molecular mechanism of S. haemolyticus to vancomycin intermediate-resistance.

Keywords: Staphylococcus haemolyticus; drug resistance gene; vancomycin intermediate-resistance; whole genome sequencing.

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant No. 81703333), Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (grant No. 2020A1515011326 and 2021A1515011360), Guangzhou Science and Technology Project (grant No. 202102080469), Guangzhou Health Science and Technology Project (grant No. 2020A010015), Medical Scientific Research Foundation of Guangdong Province (grant No. C2021077).