SOUTHEAST ASIAN J TROP MED PUBLIC HEALTH 312 Vol 36 No. 2 March 2005 Correspondence: Chanwit Tribuddharat, Department of Microbiology, Siriraj Hospital, 2 Prannok Rd, Bangkok 10700, Thailand. Tel: +66 (0) 2419-7055; Fax: +66 (0) 2411-3106 E-mail: sissf@mahidol.ac.th INTRODUCTION Salmonella is an important public health problem throughout the world. Although most Salmonella infections are self-limited, systemic infections and death can occur. Salmonella in- fection may occur in 5 different clinical forms, including gastroenteritis, enteric fever, bacter- emia, meningitis, and a chronic carrier state. Fi- nally, Salmonella may localize to one site in the body, often producing a characteristic clinical syndrome. Acute meningitis due to Salmonella spp is an unusual clinical problem occuring pri- marily in newborns and young infants in whom it is associated with significant mortality. In 1999, three forths of the reported cases of Salmonella meningitis occurred among children under two years of age and the peak incidence occurred under the age of three months. The case fatality rate for Salmonella meningitis was high in all age groups; 73.5% overall and 92.5% in the neona- tal patients (Hendersen, 1999). In general, anti- microbial agents are not essential for the treat- ment of most Salmonella infections, but they can be life-saving in the case of severe infection. Fluoroquinolones, such as ciprofloxacin, are commonly used for adult patients with Salmo- nella infection and for the treatment of acute gastroenteritis. The use of ampicillin, chloram- phenicol and co-trimoxazole is limited because of increasing antimicrobial resistance to these agents (Cohen and Tauxe, 1986). While Salmo- nella spp are initially detected by their biochemi- cal characteristics, groups and species are iden- tified by antigenic analysis. Like other Entero- bacteriaceae, they posses several O antigens (from a total of more than 60) and different H antigens in one or both of two phases. Some Salmonella have capsular (K) antigens, referred to as Vi, which may interfere with agglutination by O antisera and are associated with invasive- ness. Agglutination tests with absorbed anti- sera for different O and H antigens form the ba- sis for serologic classification (Brooks et al, 2001). In this study, we analyzed data of bacte- rial meningitis caused by various serogroups of Salmonella and their antimicrobial susceptibility patterns. MATERIALS AND METHODS Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) was obtained from patients suspected of having bacterial meningi- tis who were admitted to Siriraj Hospital during a 15-year period (1986-2001). Bacterial identification procedure CSF was cultured on 5% sheep blood agar and chocolate agar at 35ºC in a 5% CO 2 incu- bator. Salmonella was identified by standard microbiological techniques and serogrouping by slide agglutination by specific antisera purchased from Biotechnical (Thailand), ie, polyvalent A-67, polyvalent A-I, Salmonella Vi, antiserum specifi- SALMONELLA MENINGITIS AND ANTIMICROBIAL SUSCEPTIBILITIES Somporn Srifuengfung 1 , Kulkanya Chokephaibulkit 2 , Thitiya Yungyuen 1 and Chanwit Tribuddharat 1 1 Department of Microbiology; 2 Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine at Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University, Bangkok, Thailand Abstract. Meningitis caused by Salmonella species is not uncommon in many developing countries. Patients suspected of bacterial meningitis who were admitted to Siriraj Hospital were enrolled in this study during 1986-2001. There were only 19 cases of Salmonella meningitis. Salmonella serogroup D ranked first, followed by serogroup C, serogroup B and then serogroup H. Most patients were children under 1 year of age. The antimicrobial susceptibility pattern for Salmonella meningitis may provide a guideline for the selection of appropriate drug treatment.