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Microbial assessment of the armpits of some selected university students in Lagos, Nigeria


RE Uzeh
E Ayodele Omotayo
OO Adesoro
MO Ilori
OO Amund

Abstract

A study of the carriage of microorganisms in armpits and prevailing factors was carried out on 80 students of the University of Lagos. The armpits were swabbed and the microbiological analyses were carried out on the swab samples. The organisms isolated include Staphylococcus epidermidis (35%), Staphylococcus aureus (3%), Staphylococcus cohnii (3%), Staphylococus haemolyticus (15%), Staphylococcus hominis (25%),
Micrococcus luteus (9%), Staphylococcus capitis (6%), Staphylococcus saprophyticus (3%) and Candida tropicalis (1%). Questionnaires on gender and health related factors were administered to the subjects. Most
students regardless of sex, used toilet soap (62.5%), had their bath twice daily (60%), used sponge for body scrubbing (87.5%) and shaved regularly (78.75%) but these did not have any significant influence on the
carriage of microorganisms (P = 0.05). More female participants used deodorants, than the males. The bacterial and fungal counts in the armpits of females were lower than the counts from male armpits, which means that the use of deodorant reduced the carriage of microorganisms. From the antibiotic sensitivity tests carried out on S. aureus, the highest sensitivity was recorded for Ofloxacin while the least was for  Cotrimoxazole. However the bacterium was resistant to most antibiotics tested. The DNA profile of S. aureus showed that none of the strains had a plasmid thereby suggesting that the antibiotic resistance genes in these strains could be chromosomally-encoded.

Keywords: Microorganisms, armpit, university students, Lagos, Nigeria.

Journal Identifiers


eISSN: 1997-342X
print ISSN: 1991-8631