Previous Article | Next Article ![]()
Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, September 2004, p. 3419-3424, Vol. 48, No. 9
0066-4804/04/$08.00+0 DOI: 10.1128/AAC.48.9.3419-3424.2004
Copyright © 2004, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
Department of Pharmacy Practice and Science, College of Pharmacy, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona
Received 3 February 2004/ Returned for modification 4 April 2004/ Accepted 11 May 2004
|
|
|---|
|
|
|---|
50% is often necessary to avoid the antibacterial effects of serum itself. Serum may inhibit bacterial growth or cause the killing of bacteria even at concentrations of <50%, requiring that serum be heat treated to destroy complement and other serum components (10, 19). There are also comparatively small molecules in serum that possess or modify antibacterial activity, as demonstrated in serum ultrafiltrates (11). Only one investigator has managed to use 100% serum for determination of the MIC (8). Using the MIC as a bioactivity endpoint presents several problems. When serum is added to broth medium, the resulting solution is cloudy, and this impairs the ability to distinguish turbidity changes related to bacterial growth. In addition, the MIC is defined discretely by fixed twofold dilutions, leading to poor accuracy in defining the effect on bioactivity. Other investigators have attempted to use bactericidal rates as an endpoint (9, 12, 16). However, in one study, changes in pH in the presence of human serum led to different effects on the activities of teicoplanin and of vancomycin (1). The authors were also unable to elicit a dose response for vancomycin and teicoplanin. Assessment of the killing rate in another study was complicated by a diminished bactericidal effect associated with increasing antibacterial concentrations, which was called a "paradoxical effect" (16).
Whether antibacterial effects are determined solely by the concentration of free, unbound antibacterial drugs is controversial. Some investigators have disputed the importance of protein binding except with drugs that exhibit very high binding levels (17). Others have asserted that only free-drug concentrations are important and that pharmacodynamic activity is determined solely by the free-drug concentration (3, 5, 6). The purpose of this study was to explicitly define the effect of protein binding of ertapenem by using the bacterial kill rate and concentration-response curves. Human serum mixtures ranging from 10 to 90% were utilized with cation-adjusted Mueller-Hinton broth (CAMHB) as the growth medium, and the test isolates were acclimated with human serum to minimize the antibacterial effects of the serum itself. Total and free-drug concentrations were measured using a validated high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) assay.
|
|
|---|
Bacteria. Two blood culture isolates of Enterobacter cloacae and Staphylococcus aureus were obtained from human blood cultures originating from a patient with more than one positive culture. Clinical isolates were chosen, assuming that the strains would better adapt to growth in human serum. The purity of the test strain was ensured by subculturing isolates at least three times before freezing the stock cultures. Each organism was serially trained to grow in 0 to 90% serum by alternating growth in human serum-CAMHB solutions with blood agar plates. The serum-acclimated organisms were maintained with growth in 50% human serum. MICs for each organism were determined using approved procedures of the NCCLS (National Committee for Clinical Laboratory Standards) (15). To ensure stability, MIC testing was performed weekly over a 3-month period for each organism in 0 to 90% human serum with CAMHB. In the case of S. aureus, the organism was grown in alternating media (blood agar and 50% human serum-CAMHB), and serum resistance was maintained with up to 90% human serum. For the E. cloacae isolate, some serum resistance was acquired, but there was initially up to a 2-log10-unit reduction in the inoculum in the test culture before growth was apparent. Thus, a subpopulation that rapidly lost serum resistance was present. The procedure was modified to use an overnight culture in 50% human serum-CAMHB for the inoculum. Since the inoculum could not be verified turbidimetrically, the conditions were standardized and the procedures were adjusted to produce the correct inoculum in the test cultures. It was determined that a fresh culture needed to be started in 50% human serum 1 h prior to inoculation of the test culture to achieve logarithmic growth and avoid killing due to human serum.
Killing of bacteria.
Kill rate experiments were performed in triplicate in media containing human serum at concentrations between 0 and 90% (10% increments). At baseline, 10-ml volumes of test solutions were inoculated with
106 organisms per ml. Immediately after inoculation, various concentrations of ertapenem (0 to 32 x MIC) were added to the test solutions. Each culture was gently agitated during incubation at 35°C. Viable-colony counts were determined at 0 (baseline), 4, 6, and 24 h by serial dilution coupled with a pour plate technique. In order to obtain a lower limit of sensitivity of 30 colonies per ml, a centrifuge technique followed by saline washes was used to remove residual drug. Higher colony counts were determined following simple dilution of the culture suspension with sterile saline.
Overnight cultures of the S. aureus isolate grown on blood agar were used to prepare the inoculum. For the E. cloacae organism, 100 µl of an overnight inoculum in 50% human serum was added to 9.9 ml of test solution and reincubated for 1 h to achieve logarithmic growth. In both cases, the suspensions were adjusted based on turbidity to provide bacterial counts of
106 organisms/ml. The procedures were checked experimentally and adjusted to result in the correct final inoculum concentration.
Analytical study of ertapenem. A previously described HPLC assay was modified and validated for determination of free and total ertapenem concentrations in human serum, CAMHB, and mixtures of the two (20). The procedure utilized a reverse-phase column (Synergi Hydro-RP 80A; 250- by 4.6-mm inside diameter; 0.4-µm particle size) and a C18 guard column obtained from Phenomenex (Torrance, Calif.) with UV detection at 315 nm. The mobile phase consisted of a 10:1:89 ratio of acetonitrile, tetrahydrofuran, and 0.025 M citrate buffer (pH 4.5). The assay range was 0.4 to 100 µg/ml, and the between-day precision was 4.47% at 2.5 µg/ml, 9.92% at 40 µg/ml, and 6.46% at 80 µg/ml.
Human serum solutions with concentrations ranging from 0 to 100% using 10% increments were prepared with CAMHB diluent. Portions of these 11 different solutions were supplemented with 12 and 50 µg of ertapenem/ml. Each ertapenem-containing solution was split to determine total and free-ertapenem concentrations. To determine the total concentration, the samples were mixed 1:1 with stabilizer (0.2 M citrate buffer, pH 6.5) and frozen at 80°C until they were analyzed. To determine the free concentration, the samples were ultrafiltered using an Amicon Centrifree YM-30 cartridge (Millipore, Burlington, Mass.) with centrifugation at 1,500 x g for 30 min (18, 20). The ultrafiltrate was then mixed 1:1 with stabilizer and frozen at 80°C. All samples were prepared and assayed in triplicate. Quality control samples were prepared in a 1:3 mixture of human serum-CAMHB ultrafiltrate after determining that the ratio did not affect the recovery of ertapenem after ultrafiltration. Standard samples were all prepared in CAMHB ultrafiltrate. Standards and quality control samples were mixed 1:1 with stabilizer prior to assay or storage.
All samples were extracted using solid-phase extraction columns (Strata-X; 33-µm polymeric sorbent; 60 mg/3 ml; Phenomenex). The columns were conditioned using acetonitrile and 0.0025 M citrate buffer (pH 4.5). Thawed samples (0.5 ml) were mixed 1:1 with 0.25 M citrate buffer (pH 4.1) and immediately loaded onto the column. The column was washed with 0.0025 M citrate buffer (pH 4.5). The sample was eluted with 0.5 ml of 10% acetonitrile in 0.1 M MES buffer (pH 6.5). The eluent was centrifuged at 9,000 x g for 5 min, and the supernatant was injected into the HPLC system.
Pharmacodynamic analysis. The data from the in vitro and analytical studies were analyzed for the rate and extent of killing of bacteria in relation to total and free-ertapenem concentrations at various percentages of human serum. The growth rate at a given ertapenem concentration and medium condition was defined as follows: [ln(final colony count) ln(baseline colony count)]/time interval. Thus, the growth rate was positive when bacterial counts increased and negative when the counts decreased. The adjusted kill rate (KR) was defined as the growth rate (without antibacterial agent) minus the test growth rate (at specific ertapenem concentrations) under the same medium conditions.
Concentration-effect profiles were fitted with nonlinear regression analysis based on the Sigmoid Emax equation and WinNonlin standard edition version 2.1 (Pharsight Corp., Cary, N.C.) software. Derived parameters included the maximum adjusted kill rate (KRmax), the concentration at the half-maximum adjusted kill rate (50% effective concentration [EC50]), and Hill's coefficient (h), where C is the concentration: KR = (KRmax x Ch)/(EC50h + Ch).
The primary objective of this investigation was to determine if the unbound concentration of ertapenem was solely responsible for the antibacterial activity observed against the test organisms. This was determined by modeling the relationship between the killing of bacteria and the unbound- and total ertapenem concentrations.
|
|
|---|
|
View this table: [in a new window] |
TABLE 1. Pharmacodynamic parameters (based on 4-h endpoint) for ertapenem associated with various percentages of human serum in CAMHB
|
![]() View larger version (10K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 1. Unbound concentrations of ertapenem at 12 ( ) and 50 ( ) µg/ml at various human serum proportions.
|
Examples of kill curves at 0, 40, and 80% human serum in CAMHB for the E. cloacae and S. aureus organisms are shown in Fig. 2 and 3, respectively. A concentration-effect relationship was established at all human serum concentrations. Table 1 provides the mean pharmacodynamic parameters for each concentration of human serum. Increased proportions of human serum were associated with increased concentrations of ertapenem required to achieve the same adjusted kill rates. Figure 4 shows examples of concentration-effect curves for E. cloacae and S. aureus using human serum concentrations of 0, 40, and 80%. The profiles show similar adjusted-kill-rate-versus-concentration curves that are shifted to the right with increasing percentages of human serum. KRmax values were variable (coefficient of variation, 12 to 14%), but there was no trend in values according to the percentage of human serum. Figure 5 shows the relationship between the EC50 and the percentage of human serum for the two test isolates. The EC50 (log scale) increased fairly linearly with the percentage of human serum. Thus, an exponentially higher concentration is required to produce the same effect in the presence of increasing human serum concentrations. Once EC50 is expressed in terms of the free-ertapenem concentration, the unbound EC50 is constant over the range of human serum concentrations tested for E. cloacae (Fig. 6). This result indicates that the antibacterial activity is explained solely by the free-ertapenem concentration. However, a slightly positive slope is observed with the S. aureus isolate. The increase in unbound EC50 with increasing percentages of human serum is minimal in comparison to that seen with the total ertapenem concentration. One can conclude that the majority of ertapenem activity against S. aureus is explained by the free-ertapenem concentration; however, the protein binding could have been higher in the kill rate test cultures or a product of the growth in human serum mixtures could have slightly impaired killing.
![]() View larger version (27K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 2. E. cloacae kill curves with various ertapenem concentrations in 0 (top), 40 (middle), and 80% (bottom) human serum in CAMHB.
|
![]() View larger version (30K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 3. S. aureus kill curves with various ertapenem concentrations in 0 (top), 40 (middle), and 80% (bottom) human serum in CAMHB.
|
![]() View larger version (14K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 4. E. cloacae () and S. aureus ( ) adjusted kill rates versus concentration profiles for ertapenem in CAMHB with 0 (top), 40 (middle), and 80% (bottom) human serum.
|
![]() View larger version (11K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 5. Relationships between EC50 and percent human serum for the two test isolates of E. cloacae () and S. aureus ( ).
|
![]() View larger version (11K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 6. EC50 based on free ertapenem concentration versus percent human serum. Data are shown for E. cloacae () and S. aureus ( ). The lines represent the best fit lines by least-squares linear regression.
|
|
|
|---|
0.5 h), and the use of the average adjusted kill rate provides similar EC50 values. Adjusted kill rates are expected to be slightly lower than if the lag time was considered. However, omitting the lag time allows more efficient testing, given the large number of concentrations and medium conditions examined. When the EC50 based on free-ertapenem concentrations is examined relative to the percentage of human serum, the importance of the free-drug concentration becomes readily apparent. For the E. cloacae test isolate, the bioactivity was clearly explained by the free-drug concentration. The bioactivity was slightly less well explained by the free-drug concentration for the S. aureus isolate. Bioactivity was based on bacterial killing, which for ß-lactam agents occurs in actively dividing bacteria. The growth rate for S. aureus was reduced in media containing higher percentages of human serum. This could have changed the potency (EC50), although the KRmax was not affected. Also, the concentration of free drug in the test cultures could have been lower than estimated. However, the majority of the differences in bioactivity are still explained by binding to serum proteins.
Human serum itself contains substances that possess antibacterial activity. Although "serum-resistant" bacterial strains have been described, they are not routinely encountered. Untrained strains of E. cloacae and S. aureus that grow in serum-CAMHB mixtures exceeding 50% serum were not encountered in this study in searches for candidate test isolates. Many investigators have used heat-treated human serum to reduce antimicrobial activity; however, this rarely eliminates all antibacterial activity. Given the relatively frequent occurrence of bacteremia and the experience that blood culture isolates are not serum resistant after in vitro culturing, it was hypothesized that bacterial strains adapt to grow in human blood. Consequently, the test strains were conditioned in media containing increasing concentrations of human serum. The organisms adapted to growth in the human serum; however, they would lose their serum resistance after several passages in microbiological media. Initially, one isolate of Klebsiella pneumoniae was also subcultured, but the MIC was repeatedly and intermittently elevated 30-fold. Distinct subpopulations could not be isolated. Perhaps the organisms carried a resistance trait that was expressed only occasionally. The susceptibilities of the two test isolates that were used for this study remained stable over the 3-month assessment period.
Protein binding of ertapenem is nonlinear, but saturation of binding sites occurs at relatively high concentrations. Susceptible pathogens are inhibited at concentrations that are low enough to remain in the range of linear protein binding. This study included only ertapenem. Thus, the results would need to be confirmed with other highly protein-bound antibacterial agents. As shown in Table 2, ertapenem exhibited only moderate binding in various preparations of 4.5-g/dl albumin solutions in buffered saline. The binding increased only slightly when the albumin was diluted in human serum ultrafiltrate. Others have reported poor binding to albumin (S. Kiem and W. A. Craig, Abstr. 42nd Intersci. Conf. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother., abstr. A-493, 2002). To our knowledge, the protein(s) responsible for ertapenem binding has not been determined, but alpha-1 acid glycoprotein has been excluded. It is possible that slight conformational changes in purified albumin could explain the reduced binding and that albumin is the important binding protein in vivo.
|
View this table: [in a new window] |
TABLE 2. Protein binding of ertapenem in various preparations of 4.5 g of human albumin/dl and CAMHB
|
|
|
|---|
This article has been cited by other articles:
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Copyright © 2009 by the American Society for Microbiology. For an alternate route to Journals.ASM.org, visit: http://intl-journals.asm.org | More Info»