A Salmonella typhimurium Outbreak Associated With Food Served at a Wedding Reception

Objective: We aimed to present clinical and laboratory findings of patients and the molecular analysis of strains isolated in a Salmonella typhimurium outbreak associated with food served at a wedding reception. Methods: A total of 108 patients admitted to the hospital after eating food served at a wedding reception were included in the study. The patients whose symptoms continued even after supportive care were hospitalized for further treatment. Two sets of blood and stool cultures were obtained from all the hospitalized patients, and samples were taken from the implicated food source as well. The VITEK (R) 2 Compact (bioMerieux, Marcy l'Etoile, France) automated microbiology system was used together with conventional methods to identify the isolates and determine their antibiotic susceptibility. Serotyping was performed according to the Kauffmann-White scheme using the slide agglutination method. The molecular epidemiology of the isolates was determined by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis using the XbaI enzyme. Results: All the patients presented with common complaints such as fatigue, abdominal pain, fever, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting that had started 8 to 16 hours after the consumption of the food served. 45 patients were treated in the hospital whereas 63 patients were followed in an ambulatory setting after 4-6 hours of supportive care. Their hospitalization period varied between 1 and 5 days, and all patients were discharged with full recovery. S. typhimurium was isolated from stool cultures of 14 patients, and two of them were also blood culture-positive. All the isolates revealed a single clonal cluster in molecular analysis. All of them were susceptible to ampicillin, ceftriaxone, and ciprofloxacin, but resistant to amikacin. Conclusions: Despite the developments in the food industry in Turkey and across the world, food-borne disease outbreaks still occur. Hygiene rules should be strictly followed and appropriate inspections should be undertaken in the food sector to prevent food-borne outbreaks.