Staphylococcus epidermidis account for the majority of foreign body-related infections particularly catheter-related infections. Its ability to adhere to materials and to promote formation of a biofilm is the most important feature of its pathogenicity. The presence of S. epidermidis surface components particularly SesC protein is essential for biofilm formation. Accordingly, in addition to antibiotic therapy has recently been a lot of attention on the development of vaccines against S.

more »

... dis surface proteins. The aim of this study is detection of biofilm phenotype of isolated S. epidermidis from respiratory catheters of hospitalized patients and evaluation of the effect of antibodies against SesC protein on biofilm formation. In this study, we've isolated 70 coagulase-negative staphylococcus strains from respiratory catheter samples (n=350). Then, 40 isolates of these strains were randomly selected; Twenty (50%) S. epidermidis strains were identified by Mass spectrometry from all 40 isolates. From these twenty strains, 30% produced dissolvable PIA-dependent biofilms in sodium metaperiodate after growth in Tryptic soy broth (TSB) with NaCl and 40% produced dissolvable protein-dependent biofilms in proteinase K after growth in TSB with glucose. Evaluated the effect of anti-SesC antibodies on biofilm formation by using a semi quantitative adherence assay. In 40% of cases, anti-SesC antibodies had significant inhibitory effect on biofilm formation (P<0.05) in particular on protein-dependent biofilms. Although, the exact role of SesC in biofilm formation still is unknown but our findings display the importance of SesC protein on developing of biofilm formation of respiratory catheters.