Abstract

Abstract One hundred and five urine specimens have been collected from patients who suffering from urinary tract infection (UTI) in Sadder Medical City and Al-Zahraa hospital in Najaf governorate during the period from October to December 2013 and cultivated on MacConkey and EMB agar media for isolation and identification of uropathogenic E.coli, primary identification was depended on colonial morphology, microscopic examination and biochemical tests while the final identification was performed with the automated VITEK-2 compact system using Gram negative identification cards (GN-ID). The distribution of UTI in this study was more common in females (56.96%) than males (42.30%), and out of the (105) urine samples, only 27(40.6%) isolates were found to be related to E. coli. The highest occurrence was found in female sample 22 followed by male 5. The study investigated the virulence factors which responsible for pathogenesis of E.coli, 22.22% of E.coli isolates were able to produce haemolysin and 66.66% of E.coli were able to form biofilm while all isolates showed her the ability to form capsule, as for the production of gelatinase were all isolates are unproductive. The antibiotic sensitivity test was studied on 27 isolates and the results show that the isolates were resistance to Ceftazidime, Ceftriaxone, TrimethoprimSulfamethoxazole, Gentamicin, Ciprofloxacin and Nitrofurantoin with percentage (77.77%), (62.69%), (55.55%),(48.14%), (40.74%) and (11.11%) respectively while 100% of E.coli isolates were sensitive to Amikacin and Imipenem. Finally, the molecular method was used to detect pap and fim A genes by using Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) technique. The results showed that 88.88% of E.coli carry pap gene while fim A gene is found with rate 66.66%. Key word: Virulence factor genes, UPEC