METHICILLIN RESISTANT Staphylococcus epidermidis STRAINS ISOLATED FROM CHEESE CARRY DIFFERENT TYPES OF STAPHYLOCOCCAL CASSETTE CHROMOSOME mec ELEMENTS THAN CLINICAL ISOLATES

The typing of Staphylococcal Cassette Chromosome mec elements (SCCmec) is one of the most important molecular tools available for understanding the epidemiology and clonal strain relatedness of methicillin resistant staphylococci. To investigate if methicillin resistant Staphylococcus epidermidis (MRSE) strains isolated from cheese share the same Staphylococcal Cassette Chromosome mec element (SCCmec) and antibiotic resistance patterns as clinical isolates, thirty food and eleven clinical isolates of S. epidermidis were characterized by the SCCmec typing and non β-lactam antibiotics susceptibility testing. We observed that 73 % of clinical isolates but only 3 % of food isolates harboured SCCmec type IVa. Among the food isolates we detected more SCCmec types, with SCCmec type III as most prevalent. Although SCCmec types of MRSE isolated from cheese differ from SCCmec types found in MRSE isolated from clinical sources, their presented diversity is reason to concern.