1. Comparison of PCR methods for diagnosis of canine visceral leishmaniasis in conjunctival swab samples
- Author
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Pilatti, Marcia Maria, Ferreira, Sidney de Almeida, Melo, Maria Norma de, and Andrade, Antero Silva Ribeiro de
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DIAGNOSTIC use of polymerase chain reaction , *VISCERAL leishmaniasis , *CONJUNCTIVITIS , *MICROBIAL genetics , *LEISHMANIA , *GENETIC code , *DOG parasites , *DIAGNOSIS - Abstract
Abstract: Four PCR assays for detection of Leishmania DNA in conjunctival swab samples were compared. All methods had two steps: a first amplification followed by hybridization or by a new amplification (nested or seminested). Two methods (kDNA PCR-hybridization and kDNA snPCR) used primers targeted to the minicircles of kinetoplast DNA (kDNA) and the other two methods to the coding (LnPCR) and intergenic noncoding regions (ITS-1 nPCR) of ribosomal rRNA genes. kDNA PCR-hybridization was positive for 22/23 dogs (95.6%) and for 40/46 samples (86.9%), considering the right and the left conjunctivas. kDNA snPCR was positive for 21/23 dogs (91.3%) and for 40/46 samples (86.9%). The ITS-1 nPCR and LnPCR were both able to detect the parasites in 17/23 dogs (73.9%) and 29/46 (63%) and 30/46 (65.2%) samples, respectively. The positivities of the kDNA based methods were significantly higher; however the choice of the best method will depend on the kind of information required with the diagnosis. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]
- Published
- 2009
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