To evaluate the distribution and drug sensitivity of pathogenic bacteria in patients with bacterial keratitis in recent 40 years in China.

A Meta-analysis was conducted.Five databases including PubMed, ScienceDirect, Embase, CNKI and Wanfang Data Knowledge Service Platform were searched.The research was limited to the hospital-based cross-sectional studies published in Chinese and English between 1980 and 2020, without limitations of subject.Two researchers followed the inclusion and exclusion criteria to complete literature retrieval, data extraction and methodological quality evaluation.The literature quality was assessed with reference to a methodological scoring system for rates.Q test and I² test were used to quantify the degree of heterogeneity of the included literature.According to the heterogeneity, the fixed effects model or random-effects model was used to calculate the combined rates indicators to perform the Meta-analysis.

Twenty-seven original studies were incorporated, including 50 046 cases of bacterial keratitis.A random-effects model for the Meta-analysis showed that the positive rate of bacterial culture in bacterial keratitis was 28% (95% CI: 0.24-0.32). Among the culture-positive bacteria, the percentages of gram-positive cocci and gram-negative bacilli were 57% (95% CI: 0.52-0.62) and 32% (95% CI: 0.28-0.37), respectively.The percentages of gram-positive bacilli and gram-negative cocci were 8% (95% CI: 0.06-0.10) and 1% (95% CI: 0.01-0.02), respectively.In the recent 40 years, the proportion of gram-positive cocci isolated from corneas in China was on the rise, and the proportion of gram-negative bacilli was on the decline.Among them, coagulase-negative Staphylococcus accounted for 23% (95% CI: 0.17-0.30), followed by Pseudomonas aeruginosa 18% (95% CI: 0.14-0.23), Streptococcus pneumoniae 8% (95% CI: 0.06-0.12), Staphylococcus aureus 6% (95% CI: 0.04-0.08), Corynebacterium 4% (95% CI: 0.03-0.07), and Escherichia coli 4% (95% CI: 0.02-0.06). The results of the drug sensitivity test showed that gram-positive cocci were highly sensitive to vancomycin, moxifloxacin, levofloxacin and ofloxacin.Pseudomonas aeruginosa was most sensitive to tobramycin, and Escherichia coli was most sensitive to ofloxacin.

This Meta-analysis indicates that the proportion of gram-positive cocci isolated from corneas in China has been on the rise, while the proportion of gram-negative bacilli was on the decline during the recent 40 years.Coagulase-negative Staphylococcus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa have become the most common pathogens of bacterial keratitis in China.The sensitivity of various bacteria to commonly used antibiotics shows a downward trend.The sensitive antibiotics should be selected correctly according to the drug sensitivity results.

Keratitis; Bacteria; Culture; Etiology; Drug sensitivity; Meta-analysis