Korean J Clin Pathol.  2002 Apr;22(2):109-113.

Detection of the New O3:K6 Strain of Vibrio parahaemolyticus by Group-Specific Polymerase Chain Reaction

• Keum DG
• Choi TY

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Recently, a new serotype O3:K6 has caused a pandemic of Vibrio parahaemolyti-cus infection. The new O3:K6 serovar differs from the old O3:K6 strains at least in 7 base positions within a 1,346 bp region of the toxRS gene involved in the regulation of the virulence. We per-formed a group-specific polymerase chain reaction (GS-PCR) test for detection of the new O3:K6 strains using species-specific primers.
METHODS
A total of 48 V. parahaemolyticus were isolated from clinical specimens of patients with diarrhea in different geographic areas of Seoul (Hanyang University Hospital, 20 cases), Inchon (Gachon Medical Center, 26 cases) and Gwangju (Chonnam University Hospital, 2 cases) from 1998 to 2001 in Korea. All isolates were examined for the presence of tdh/trh genes and ure-ase activity. The serovars of isolates were determined by slide agglutination tests with specific anti-sera (O3:K6/O4:K68). A GS-PCR method, detecting the new O3:K6 clone, was used in this study.
RESULTS
All these isolates carried the tdh gene but not the trh gene and did not produce urease. The thirty three of the 48 samples (69%) were positive using the GS-PCR method. Thirty of thirty three cases (91%) were O3:K6 using the slide agglutination test. The three cases (9%) were O4:K68.
CONCLUSIONS
We confirmed the epidemicity of the new V. parahaemolyticus O3:K6 using the GS-PCR method in Korea.

Keyword

Vibrio parahaemolyticus; Serovar; Group specific; Polymerase Chain Reaction

MeSH Terms

Agglutination Tests
Clone Cells
Diarrhea
Gwangju
Humans
Incheon
Korea
Pandemics
Polymerase Chain Reaction*
Seoul
Urease
Vibrio parahaemolyticus*
Vibrio*
Virulence
Urease