Study of the Antibacterial Activity of Levofloxacin Biocomplexes Based on Natural and Synthetic Polymers on Medical Meshes

In the presented article, a model system was created and tested on cultures to determine the antibacterial activity of composites without metal nanoparticles, as well as those containing silver (Ag) and magnetite (Fe3O4) nanoparticles.During surgical operations for abdominal hernias, special antisterile synthetic meshes made of polyvinylidene fluoride were impregnated with polymer matrices, their homopolymer mixtures, and solutions with levofloxacin.The polymer-and polymer/drug-impregnated meshes were placed in bacterial media in Petri dishes, and their antibacterial activity was compared based on the diameter of the resulting lysis zones.For control purposes, levofloxacin alone was also impregnated into synthetic meshes with a size of 1 cm and a mass of 30-40 mg, and experiments were conducted.Each synthetic mesh was impregnated with polymer samples comprising about 15-20 % of the mass, a metal oxide-metal nanoparticle coated with a polymer chain, and approximately 5 micrograms of levofloxacin.It was found that the homogeneous systems containing metal nanoparticles both levofloxacin free and the levofloxacinloaded samples had a stronger microbial effect.This led to an increase in the area of the lysis zone.This effect is naturally related to the antibacterial properties of the metal nanoparticles themselves, which make the composite more effective in killing microbes.Additionally, compared to samples without nanoparticles, the lysis zone remains stable for a longer period.