Time-Kill Assay: An Efficacy of Synergy Between Carbapenems and Clodronic Acid

Abstract

Abstract. Currently, a search for augmenting antibiotics activity is still crucial due to elevated frequency of detecting carbapenem-resistant Gran-positive bacterial isolates. To resolve this, it might be reasonable to combine carbapenems metal-â-lactamase (MâL) inhibitors. Unfortunately, no MâL inhibitors approved for treatment of carbapenem-resistant infections are currently available. Pathogenic bacteria may survive antibiotic attack, exert tolerance and persistence accompanied with the ongoing infectious process. In connection with this, determining dependence between antimicrobialrelated bactericidal effect and exposure time on microbes at 4, 8, 12 and 24 hours after the onset, a so called time-kill assay, is necessary. A synergy between both agents was noted upon reduced microbial population by ≥ 3 log10. A checkerboard array followed by seeding the microplate well contents onto a dense nutrient medium at various time points were used to assess a synergistic efficacy of carbapenems applied together with clodronic acid against MâL-producing VIMgenotype P. aeruginosa 532/14 clinical isolate obtained from patients with infectious complications (minimal inhibitory concentrations [MIC] for imipenem or meropenem were 512 μg/ml), microbial burden 106 CFU/ml. Optical density was measured at two wavelengths (490 and 630 nm) in ELx800 reader, within 4–24 hour exposure time to determine time of logarithmic growth phase emerging in test culture. It is noteworthy that magnitude of optical density is a difference between two bichromatic measurements resulting in remarkably reduced inaccuracy due to scratches or fingerprints left on the plate. It was found that clodronic acid exhibited a synergic bactericidal effect with carbapenems against a clinically resistant MâL-producing VIM-genotype P. aeruginosa 532/14 strain. Upon that, imipenem-related antimicrobial activity was evident as early as 8 hours after the onset decreasing cell growth down to 1.4 log10 compared to control, whereas 12 hours later it resulted in total inhibition of test strain by decreasing growth of the test strain by 6 log10. Meropenem in combination with clodronic acid showed a more pronounced activity: complete absence of P. aeruginosa 532/14 growth by 8 hours of incubation, growth suppression by 3.2 log10, which reached 6 log10 12–24 hours after the onset. Time-kill assay allows to identify efficient combinations of carbapenems and MâL inhibitors, which is of great importance for increasing therapeutic efficacy of patients with severe purulent-septic complications.