High Frequency of Chlamydia trachomatis Mixed Infections Detected by Microarray Assay in South American Samples

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 11; no. 4; p. e0153511
• Main Authors: Gallo Vaulet, Lucía, Entrocassi, Carolina, Portu, Ana I, Castro, Erica, Di Bartolomeo, Susana, Ruettger, Anke, Sachse, Konrad, Rodriguez Fermepin, Marcelo
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 15-04-2016; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Assaying; Bacterial Typing Techniques - methods; Biology and Life Sciences; Chlamydia; Chlamydia Infections - diagnosis; Chlamydia Infections - epidemiology; Chlamydia Infections - microbiology; Chlamydia trachomatis; Chlamydia trachomatis - genetics; Chlamydia trachomatis - isolation & purification; Chlamydophila; Coinfection; Condoms; Deoxyribonucleic acid; Diagnosis; Disease; DNA; DNA microarrays; DNA, Bacterial - genetics; DNA, Bacterial - isolation & purification; Epidemiology; Ethics; Female; Female Urogenital Diseases - epidemiology; Female Urogenital Diseases - microbiology; Genetic aspects; Genotype; Genotypes; Genotyping; Health aspects; Hospitals; Humans; Identification; Infections; Major outer membrane protein; Male; Male Urogenital Diseases - epidemiology; Male Urogenital Diseases - microbiology; Medicine and Health Sciences; Membrane proteins; Mens health; Molecular Diagnostic Techniques - methods; Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis - methods; OmpA protein; Pathogenesis; Pathogenicity; Pathogens; Polymerase chain reaction; Polymerase Chain Reaction - methods; Polymorphism, Restriction Fragment Length; Prevalence; Research and Analysis Methods; Restriction fragment length polymorphism; Sexually transmitted diseases; South America - epidemiology; Standardization; Tropism; South America; Germany; Chile; Argentina
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0153511

Chlamydia trachomatis is one of the most common sexually transmitted infections worldwide. Based on sequence variation in the ompA gene encoding the major outer membrane protein, the genotyping scheme distinguishes 17 recognized genotypes, i.e. A, B, Ba, C, D, Da, E, F, G, H, I, Ia, J, K, L1, L2, and L3. Genotyping is an important tool for epidemiological tracking of C. trachomatis infections, including the revelation of transmission pathways and association with tissue tropism and pathogenicity. Moreover, genotyping can be useful for clinicians to establish the correct treatment when LGV strains are detected. Recently a microarray assay was described that offers several advantages, such as rapidity, ease of standardization and detection of mixed infections. The aim of this study was to evaluate the performance of the DNA microarray-based assay for C. trachomatis genotyping of clinical samples already typed by PCR-RFLP from South America. The agreement between both typing techniques was 90.05% and the overall genotype distribution obtained with both techniques was similar. Detection of mixed-genotype infections was significantly higher using the microarray assay (8.4% of cases) compared to PCR-RFLP (0.5%). Among 178 samples, the microarray assay identified 10 ompA genotypes, i.e. D, Da, E, F, G, H, I, J, K and L2. The most predominant type was genotype E, followed by D and F.