Microbial contamination of traditional manufactured ice creams in Aleshtar and Kuhdasht in Lorestan province

The nutritional value¡ tasting and other desirable features of ice cream well known to eve-rybody. Nevertheless¡ it can be a good source for a variety of human pathogenic bacteria. This study was performed to the evaluation bacterial contamination of traditional ice creams produced in Aleshtar and Kuhdasht cities¡ Lorestan province.
In this cross-sectional study¡ 40 samples were taken using systematic sampling method from 20 production centers of traditional ice cream in Aleshtar and Kuhdasht cities of Lorestan during summer sea-son. All samples were analyzed in terms of enumeration of total bacteria¡ the presence Escherichia coli¡ Salmonella Spp.¡ Staphylococcus aureus and Enterobacteriaceae according to the Iranian national standard. Data were described and analyzed with SPSS 19.0 software using analytical statistics of X2 and Fisher tests at a significance level of 0.05.
Findings showed 53.34% and 56% of samples were contaminated with Escherichia coli and En-terobacteriaceae in Aleshtar and Kouhdasht cities¡ respectively. Contamination with Total coliforms¡ Sal-monella Spp. and Staphylococcus aureus was not observed in samples. Significant relationship was found between personal hygiene and sanitation of producing or sale site of ice creams (P According to identify the Escherichia coli and Enterobacteriaceae in samples¡ maintaining personal hygiene and resolving health problems in producing and selling centers of traditional ice cream can be effective in reducing and preventing bacterial contamination of traditional ice creams.