Microbiologia Médica e Diagnóstico

In-House Validation of Rapid Detection PCRs for Bacterial Pathogens Causing Infant Diarrhea

Abstract

Londero A, Leotta GA, Brusa V, Costa M, Golijow C, Gutkind G, Gonzalez E and Galli L

In Argentina, conventional culture methods for the isolation of diarrheal bacteria continue to be the most widely used form of diagnosis in many clinical laboratories. In this work we validated 11 in-house real-time polymerase chain reactions (PCRs) assays for the specific and rapid detection of Salmonella spp., Shigella spp., enteroinvasive E. coli, enteropathogenic E. coli, enterotoxigenic E. coli, Shiga toxin-producing E. coli, E. coli O157, Cronobacter sakazakii, Campylobacter jejuni, Campylobacter coli, Vibrio cholera and Clostridium difficile. The sensitivity of the assays was less than 102 CFU/ml for all the studied pathogens; selectivity and specificity were 100% in all cases and robustness was optimal. These PCR methods could be used to accurately detect the main bacterial causes of infant gastroenteritis.