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Background: Food borne diseases are major public health problems in developing countries like Ethiopia. Food handlers with poor personal hygiene working in hospitals could be infected with different intestinal parasites and pathogenic enteric bacteria. Therefore they could pose potential risk of transmitting food borne infection to patients and the community. Objective: To determine the prevalence of intestinal parasites and gastrointestinal carriage of pathogenic gram negative enteric bacteria among food handlers of public hospitals. Methods: Institutional based cross sectional study was conducted from March to June, 2017. Structured questionnaires were used to collect socio demographic and other related information. About 4gram of freshly passed stool specimen was collected. Direct wet mount smear examination and formol ether concentration techniques were done for detection of parasites. Culture and series of biochemical tests were done for detection and identification of pathogenic enteric bacteria respectively. Antimicrobial sensitivity test was done by Kirby-Bauer disk diffusion method. Data was analyzed using statistical package for social science. Results: In this study, 368 food handlers were participated and 81% were females. Out of 368 stool specimens 119(32.34%) were positive for at least one intestinal parasite. The most prevalent parasite was Entamoeba histolytica/dispar 48(13%), followed by Giardia lamblia 36(9.78%), Taenia Species 21(5.7%), Ascaris lumbricoide 8(2.2%), Trichuris trichiura 5(1.4%) and Hook worm 1(0.3%). Regarding enteric bacteria 17(4.6%) food handlers were positive for Salmonella 14(3.8%) and Shigella flexneri 3(0.8%). No E.coli O157:H7 was isolated. All, (n=14), Salmonella isolates were resistant to ampicillin (10μg) and erythromycin (15μg) and sensitive to Ciprofloxacin(5μg), Gentamycin(10μg) and Doxycycllin(30μg). Similarly all (n=3) Shigella flexneri isolates were resistant to ampicillin (10μg) & tetracycline (30μg) and sensitive to Cefotaxime(5μg), Ciprofloxacin(5μg), Gentamycin(10μg), Chloroamphenicol(30μg). All Salmonella and Shigella flexneri isolates were multidrug resistant. Conclusion: Strong system to provide health education and training, frequent, regular and comprehensive medical screening of food handlers could be important intervention to break the chain of infection that may arise from them. |
