Objectives?To establish a method to rapidly screen the carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) bacteria colonized in intestine by using modified MacConkey plate, and evaluate the performance.?Methods?The modified MacConkey plates with final concentrations of 4 μg/mL imipenem, 4 μg/mL meropenem and 2 μg/mL ertapenem were prepared respectively. The 45 strains of CRE and 30 strains of non-CRE were selected and continuously isolated from clinical samples to detect the sensitivity and specificity of the modified MacConkey plate. Twenty stains of CRE among the above strains were used to evaluate the minimum detection limit of the modified plate. PCR method was used to detect drug resistance genes of CRE strains, i.e.,?TEM,?SHV,?NDM,?KPC,?OXA-48,?VIM?and?IMP. A total of 142 stool samples were collected to evaluate the screening performance of the modified plate and compared with the results of broth-enhancing bacteria method and CHROMagar KPC chromogenic medium.?Results?Among the 45 strains, the detection rates of?TEM?and?SHV?were 62.22% (28/45) and 24.44% (11/45). The detection rates of?NDM,?KPC?and?OXA-48?were 62.22% (28/45), 15.56% (7/45) and 13.33% (6/45) respectively. No?VIM?and?IMP?were detectable. All the 45 CRE strains were grown on modified ertapenem plates, 44 strains were grown on modified imipenem plates, and 43 strains were grown on modified meropenem plates. The sensitivities were 100% (45/45), 97.78% (44/45) and 95.56% (43/45) respectively. The 30 non-CRE strains did not grow on modified imipenem and meropenem plates, but 2 strains were grown on modified ertapenem plates with specificities of 100% (30/30), 100% (30/30) and 93.33% (28/30) for the 3 antibiotics respectively. Among the 20 CRE strains, when the inoculation concentration was 105?to 108?CFU/mL, the detection rates of modified plates of imipenem, meropenem and ertapenem were 70% (14/20) , 65% (13/ 20) and 100% (20/20) respectively; when the inoculation concentration was less than 105?CFU/mL, the detection rates of modified plates of imipenem, meropenem and ertapenem were 10% (2/20), 10%(2/20) and 95% (19/20) respectively. The minimum detection limits of modified MacConkey plates of imipenem and meropenem were mostly distributed at the inoculation levels of 105?to108?CFU/mL, while the minimum detection limits of modified ertapenem MacConkey plates were concentrated at the distribution between 102?and 103?CFU/mL. Among the 142 stool samples, 3, 2 and 4 stains of CRE were screened on modified imipenem, meropenem and ertapenem MacConkey plates respectively, and no non-CRE strains were detectable. Five CRE and 2 non-CRE strains were screened by broth-enhancing bacteria method, and 5 CRE strains and 1 non-CRE strain were screened by CHROMagar KPC chromogenic medium. There was no significant difference among the screening results of the three modified plate and broth-enhancing bacteria method and CHROMagar KPC chromogenic medium (P>0.05). Compared with imipenem and meropenem, the results of ertapenem plate screening were more consistent with broth-enhancing bacteria method and CHROMagar KPC chromogenic medium with?Kappa?values of 0.717 and 0.885 respectively.?Conclusion?The modified MacConkey plate designed in this study showed high sensitivity and specificity, simple operation, low price and low technical requirements for operators. Among the improved modified MacConkey plates, the ertapenem plate showed lower detection limit and better consistency with the broth-enhancing bacteria method and CHROMagar KPC chromogenic medium for the screening results, and should be more suitable for popularized application.