Int J Infect Dis

Outbreak of Salmonella enteritidis gastroenteritis: investigation by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis.

Year 1998
Thong KL. Puthucheary S. Pang T.
Centre for Foundation Studies in Science, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
OBJECTIVE: Pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) was used to investigate an outbreak of gastroenteritis caused by Salmonella enteritidis. The outbreak occurred among university undergraduates who consumed contaminated food. METHOD: Molecular typing was done by analyzing DNA band patterns of isolates of S. enteritidis after digestion of chromosomal DNA with infrequently-cutting restriction endonucleases XbaI, AvrII, and SpeI and separation of DNA fragments using PFGE. RESULTS: Twenty-nine outbreak isolates of S. enteritidis had identical or highly similar PFGE patterns, whereas different PFGE patterns were observed among three epidemiologically unrelated isolates obtained during the same period. CONCLUSION: The data obtained confirm the value of PFGE in epidemiologic investigations of outbreaks caused by S. enteritidis.