TITLE:
Effect of Photoactivated Hypericin on Growth and Antibiotic Susceptibility of Hospital-Related Staphylococcus aureus and Enterococcus sp. Clinical Strains
AUTHORS:
Maria Nagyova, Leonard Siegfried, Daniel Jancura, Daniel Jancura, Zuzana Nadova
KEYWORDS:
Antimicrobial Photodynamic Therapy, Hypericin, Antibiotic Resistance, Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus, Vancomycin-Resistant Enterococcus sp.
JOURNAL NAME:
Advances in Biological Chemistry,
Vol.12 No.4,
August
30,
2022
ABSTRACT: Resistance against commonly used antibiotics is a
serious clinical problem in recent medical practice. There exist several
bacterial strains in which the possibilities of their inhibition are very
limited due to multidrug resistance. Antimicrobial photodynamic therapy (aPDT)
represents an option how to effectively suppress the growth of resistant
pathogens. In this work we have studied
interactions of potent photosensitizer hypericin (Hyp) with hospital-related gram positive (Gram+) and gram negative
(Gram-) bacterial strains and the effects of photodynamic activated Hyp
on bacterial susceptibility and/or resistance of these strains to antibiotics.
We demonstrated a significant influence of photoactivated Hyp on growth of Staphylococcus aureus and Enterococcus sp. We have also shown that
it is extremely important to use the effective concentrations of Hyp for aPDT,
which completely inhibit the growth of microorganisms. Otherwise, there appears
an increase in resistance, probably due to the activation of efflux mechanisms,
which are involved in the efflux of Hyp and antibiotics as well.