RESUMO

BACKGROUND: After the dissemination of penicillin and oxacillin resistance in Staphylococcus aureus, vancomycin-intermediate and vancomycin resistant isolates have been reported. Even between isolates with minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) within the susceptible range, some authors have demonstrated that higher MICs correlate with higher lethality. METHODS: To test this hypothesis in our setting, we compared vancomycin MICs evaluated by two methods and clinical outcomes in hospitalized patients with S. aureus bacteremia. RESULTS: We compared lethality in patients infected with isolates that had MICs under or over 2 mg/L. Among patients infected with isolates that had microdilution MICs <2 mg/L, the lethality was 25%; among patients infected with strains that had microdilution MICs ≥2 mg/L, 33% died. Among patients infected with isolates that had Etest MICs <2 mg/L, 23% died; in comparison, patients infected with strains that had Etest MICs ≥2 mg/L had a lethality of 44%. CONCLUSION: Our results showed a slight tendency of higher lethality when higher MICs were present. However, this difference did not reach statistical significance, possibly due to the relatively small number of patients included in the study. Future prospective studies are needed to further evaluate this correlation and to help clinicians guide antimicrobial therapy.