Introduction: Escherichia coli (E. coli) was the most common bacteria isolated both from urine and stones in calcium oxalate (CaOx) stone patients. However, the differences between E. coli from urine culture (EUC) and E. coli from stone culture (ESC) remain to be elucidated.
Methods: Total of 83 clinical isolates (33 EUC and 50 ESC) from 66 CaOx stone patients were included. To assess the characteristics and relationships between ESC and EUC isolates, antimicrobial susceptibility test, phylogenetic grouping and genotyping were performed. In addition, whole genome sequencing and comparative genomic analysis were conducted in the 16 strains isolated from 8 patients with paired of ESC and EUC.
Results: The antimicrobial susceptibility data revealed that E. coli had multidrug resistance (MDR), and ESC and EUC may be associated with same resistant gene patterns. The most common phylogenetic group was B2, which account for 54.0% of ESC samples and 69.7% of EUC samples. ST1193 was the most frequent genotype both in ESC (12.0%) and EUC (27.3%). The ESC and EUC samples from the same patients shared consistent virulence genes, which were highly homologous and largely consistent. The ESC and EUC in the same patients were also located in the same clade and may thus originate from a common ancestor.
Conclusions: ESC and EUC in CaOx stone patients had a high prevalence of phylogenetic groups. ESC and EUC isolated from the same patient had consistent antimicrobial susceptibility profiles, phylogenetic groups, genotypes, virulence genes, resistance genes, high sequence co-linearity and close relationships. Source of
