B05 THE MICROBIOLOGICAL STATUS OF MOBILE PHONES OF SURGEONS Jeyaseelan senthinath T* Vigneswaraan, Sathish, Santhiya devi, Sivashankar A.

Uma, Thirumalaikolundusubramanian.P, Department of Microbiology, Chennai Medical College Hospital & Research Centre (SRM GROUP), Irungalur, Trichy
Background: Mobile phones have become indispensable accessories for health care professionals (HCP). HCP use mobile phones while on duty. Microbial contamination of mobile phones of HCP is less studied from India. Objectives: To analyse the microbiological status of mobile phones of surgeons. Materials & Methods: Premoistened sterile swabs were used for sample collection. Swabs were taken from the surface of mobile phone of 30 surgeons and transported to laboratory in cotton plugged sterile tubes. The swabs are inoculated in Nutrient agar, Blood Agar, Mac agar. After aerobic incubation at 37C for 24 hours the agar plates were examined for bacterial growth. The isolate were identified by biochemical tests. The data was analysed by simple description statistics.Results: Of the 30 samples analysed, 28 pathogenic bacteria were isolated (Gram positive = 6 Gram negative= 22) and of these 15 were multidrug resistant (MDR) Comments: As pathogenic bacteria were prevalent in the mobile phones of surgeon and as they use their phones while on duty or when attending the patients, they are likely to transmit MDR Strains. Further studies from doctors belonging to different specialties are required to arrive at a valid conclusion and to provide suggestions and recommendations

B-06 TREATMENT OF BOTULISM USING PANTOIC ACID EXTRACTED FROM ALOE VERA Azarudeen.A, Bharathi Raja.S, Mano.S, Department of Biotechnology, III year, Kalasalingam University, Krishnankoil-626190. Botulism is a serious illness that causes flaccid paralysis of muscles. It is caused by a neurotoxin, generically called botulinum toxin, produced by the bacterium Clostridium.The C botulinumis an anaerobic, Gram positive, spore-forming rod. Botulin toxin is one of the most powerful known toxins about one microgram is lethal to humans. It acts by blocking nerve function and leads to respiratory and musculoskeletal paralysis. The highly potent botulinum neurotoxins are responsible for botulism, a severe neuroparalytic Strains of nonproteolytic C. botulinum form neurotoxins of types B, E and F, and are the main hazard associated with minimally heated refrigerated foods. Aloe vera, is a species of succulent plant in the genus Aloe that is believed to have originated in the Sudan. Aloe vera grows in arid climates and is widely distributed in Africa, India, and other arid areas. The species is frequently cited as being used in herbal medicine. The succulent part of aloe containing pantoic acid can be extracted for the treatement of Botulism. Using bioinformatics tools such as Orgustlab and castp the gene responsible for producing Botulin toxin can be identified and can be genetically replaced with that of pantoicacid present in aloevera.The result proved reduction in the level of infection and the disease was less expressed to certain extent