Carbapenem resistance (CRE) or carbapenemase -producing Enterobacteriaceae (CPE) is an increasing problem worldwide. Carbapemens, the last line of therapy, are now needed to treat nosocomial infections, but increased resistance to this class of B-lactam leaves physicians almost with no effective drugs. Currently, potential carbapanamase producers are first screened by susceptibility testing and then referred to a reference laboratory for PCR testing. This approach is time consuming and many carbapanamase producers do not confer obvious resistance to carbapenems. Timely identification of CPE is critical for patient care as treatment regime will change and also very important for infection control purpose.
CarbaNP test was introduced by Dr Patrick Nordmann, etc in 2012, which is a rapid test for detection of CRE. The test was based on hydrolysis of the B-lactam ring of a carbapenem. Since then, a number of commercially available kits have been investigated for their sensitivity and specificity which are based on the same principle. In this study, we compared PCR results with a commercially available kit β CARBA which is a qualitative colorimetric test, where a change of colour indicates the presence of CPE.