Human infection by Campylobacter constitutes an important public health problem worldwide.The greatest threat comes from two species, C. jejuni and C. coli. Both are a major etiological agent of human gastroenteritis.Youtube
Campylobacteriosis is a zoonosis, a disease transmitted to humans from animals or animal products. Although in humans such infections are generally self limiting, complications can arise and may include bacteraemia, Guillain-Barré syndrome and reactive arthritis.
Campylobacters are slowly growing, fastidious organisms; they are considered to be biochemically inert. Conventionally, they are diagnosed by isolation of the organism on selective medium and identified by phenotypic tests.
The present study was performed to detect C.jejuni and C.coli within stool specimens of patients with suspected gastroenteritis like symptoms by conventional culture method and compare its result with that of immunochromatography and formulate an antibiotic policy for treatment of infections by the isolated strains.
In this study a total number of 100 stool samples were collected from patients who developed gastroenteritis like symptoms attending the Outpatient Clinic of Benha University Hospitals or admitted to the Pediatric and Internal medicine departments during the period from May 2015 to April 2016 .The age of patients ranged from 2 months to 65 years.
Each stool sample was divided into 2 parts:
- First part was cultured on a selective medium called Modified Charcoal Cefoperazone Deoxycholate Agar (mCCDA) for isolation and identification of C.jejuni and C.coli. The isolated strains will be subjected to antibiotic susceptibility testing by disc diffusion method.
-The second part was stored at –20°C until used for immunologic detection of Campylobacter antigens in human stool samples by immunochromatography .
The present study revealed that:
18% (18/100) of stool samples were positive for Campylobacter culture on Charcoal Ceferaperazone Deoxycholate Agar (CCDA media) and are oxidase and Catalase positive.13 (72.2%) out of the 18 positive isolates are C. jejuni tested positive by hippurate hydrolysis test while the other 5 (27.8%) samples are C. coli.
In present study, the infection rate was (53.7%) in males and (46.3%) in females and was the highest (46.2%) in the age group of less than 12 months.
Campylobacter infections have shown seasonality in occurrence. In the current study, Campylobacter-associated diarrhea was more common during warmer months (66.7%).
This study has shown animal exposure was the most common risk factor in Campylobacter positive cases (61.1%) followed by immune suppression (38.9%) and this was of statistical significant value (P |
