Identification of Mycobacteria Species by HPLC and Species Distribution during Five Years at Ulsan University Hospital.
10.3343/kjlm.2008.28.1.24
- Author:
Joseph JEONG
1
;
Sung Ryul KIM
;
Chulhun L CHANG
;
Seon Ho LEE
Author Information
1. Department of Laboratory Medicine, Ulsan University College of Medicine, Ulsan, Korea. joseph@uuh.ulsan.kr, 690519@hitel.net
- Publication Type:Original Article ; English Abstract
- Keywords:
Mycobacteia;
M. tuberculosis;
Nontuberculous mycobacteria;
HPLC
- MeSH:
Bacterial Typing Techniques;
Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid/*methods;
Hospitals, University;
Humans;
Korea;
Mycobacteria, Atypical/chemistry/*isolation & purification;
Mycobacterium Infections, Atypical/drug therapy/microbiology;
Mycolic Acids/analysis
- From:The Korean Journal of Laboratory Medicine
2008;28(1):24-33
- CountryRepublic of Korea
- Language:Korean
-
Abstract:
BACKGROUND: Infections caused by mycobacteria have been significantly increasing. Due to the difficulty of making a decision about the pathogenicity of mycobacteria, species-level identification is very important for patients' diagnosis and treatment. The purpose of this study was to identify mycobacteria species using a high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) method and to provide an initial database for the distribution of mycobacteria in Korea. METHODS: Acid fast bacteria isolated from 3,107 clinical specimens were identified by mycolic acid analysis using HPLC. The HPLC patterns were compared with those of standard mycobacteria species. RESULTS: The HPLC patterns were divided into single, double, and triple cluster groups, each group comprising 9, 20, and 4 species, respectively. Mycobacteria and non-tuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) were identifies by HPLC at the rates of 99.5% and 95.6%, respectively. NTM was isolated in 12.4% of the mycobacteria positive specimens. This study also found that there were 20 different NTM species with the distribution of each species ranging from 0.3% to 15.9% of the total NTM. While the rate of NTM has been increasing in Korea, M. avium-intracellulare, M. fortuitum, and M. chelonae are relatively decreasing, and M. kansasii and M. gordonae are relatively increasing. CONCLUSIONS: HPLC method was highly discriminative for the identification of NTM in clinical specimens.
