Grant: Undergraduate Student Research Awards (USRA)

"Staphylococcus aureus is a Gram positive bacteria that can cause serious infections of blood, bone, joint, deep abscesses and lung. Cefazolin is the first line antibiotic to treat methicillin-susceptible Staphylococcus aureus (MSSA) infections. In research labs, it has been observed that some MSSA bacterial isolates display the cefazolin inoculum effect where the MSSA bacterial isolate becomes increasingly resistant to cefazolin when a higher bacterial load is tested. It is unclear if this lab phenomenon is clinically significant in terms of translating to cefazolin treatment failure. This is a translational research study. The study will include patients with serious MSSA infection treated with cefazolin at 5 Ontario hospitals. The MSSA clinical isolate will be sent to the research microbiology lab at Queen's University. The summer student will perform susceptibility testing on these MSSA clinical isolates to determine which isolates display the cefazolin inoculum effect. The presence of cefazolin inoculum effect is then correlated to patient outcome from review of patient's medical record to determine if the cefazolin inoculum effect is associated with cefazolin treatment failure."