Abstract
BACKGROUND: Trueperella pyogenes is one of the most clinically imperative bacteria responsible for severe cases of mastitis and metritis, particularly in postpartum dairy cows. The bacterium has emergence of antibiotic resistance and virulence characters. The existing research was done to apprise the phenotypic and genotypic evaluation of antibiotic resistance and characterization of virulence factors in the T. pyogenes bacteria of bovine mastitis and metritis in postpartum cows. METHODS: Two-hundred and twenty-six bovine mastitic milk and 172 uterine swabs were collected and transferred to laboratory. Samples were cultured and T. pyogenes isolates were subjected to disk diffusion and DNA extraction. Distribution of virulence and antibiotic resistance genes was studied by PCR. RESULTS: Thirty-two out of 226 (14.15%) mastitic milk and forty-one out of 172 (23.83%) uterine swab samples were positive for T. pyogenes. Isolates of mastitic milk harbored the highest prevalence of resistance toward gentamicin (100%), penicillin (100%), ampicillin (90.62%), amoxicillin (87.50%) and trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole (87.50%), while those of metritis harbored the highest prevalence of resistance toward ampicillin (100%), amoxicillin (100%), gentamicin (97.56%), penicillin (97.56%) and cefalexin (97.56%). AacC, aadA1, aadA2 and tetW were the most generally perceived antibiotic resistance genes. All bacteria harbored plo (100%) and fimA (100%) virulence factors. NanP, nanH, fimC and fimE were also the most generally perceived virulence factors. CONCLUSIONS: All bacteria harbored plo and fimA virulence factors which showed that they can use as specific genetic markers with their important roles in pathogenicity of T. pyogenes bacteria. Phenotypic pattern of antibiotic resistance was confirmed by genotypic characterization of antibiotic resistance genes.