Abstract

The objective of this study was to determine the prevalence and antibiotics susceptibility patterns of common bacterial uropathogens, and identify associated risk factors of UTIs from pregnant women attending antenatal care clinic of St.Paul Hospital Millennium Medical College and Selam Health Center, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Cross sectional study was conducted among pregnant women attending antenatal care clinic at St. Paul Hospital Millennium Medical College and Selam Health Center from September to November, 2013. Urine samples (5-10ml) were collected from a total of 320 pregnant women. Data were cleaned with EPI info version 3.5.1 and transferred to SPSS version 21 for analysis. Frequencies and percentage for each variable were calculated. Binary logistic regression was used to identify association between variables. Tables and figures were used for data presentation. Bacteriological screening of urine samples revealed significant growth of bacteria in 28.8% and 23.5% for symptomatic and asymptomatic pregnant women respectively with overall prevalence of 25.9%. The most common isolates detected were E.coli (27.7%), S.saprophyticus (26.5%) and S.aureus (21.6%). Both gram positive (GP) and gram negative (GN) bacteria showed high sensitivity against Nitrofurantoin with a rate of 89.28% and 81.48%, respectively. Among the risk factors assessed in this study, educational status was significantly associated with urinary tract infections (P=0.029). The magnitude of urinary tract infections with isolation of bacterial pathogens both from symptomatic and asymptomatic pregnant women, with increased resistant to the commonly prescribed antibiotics calls for an early screening of all pregnant women to UTIs and periodic monitoring any changes in the antibiotics susceptibility patterns of urinary tract pathogens.