"FimA genotypes for Porphyromonas gingivalis associated with periodontitis in diabetics".

Introduction: To identify fimA genotypes for Porphyromonas gingivalis in diabetic and non-diabetic patients to determine the most aggressive strains and their prevalence and distribution. Objective: To identify fimA genotypes for Porphyromonas gingivalis isolates in diabetic and nondiabetic patients. Methods & materials: This was a cross-sectional descriptive study that determined the frequency of 6 genotypes of FimA for P. gingivalis in 100 patients with periodontitis and systemically healthy and 100 diabetic patients with periodontitis using conventional PCR. Results & discussion: Porphyromonas gingivalis was positive in 72 of the 100 systemically healthy patients, unlike in diabetic patients that were positive for 31 of the 100 patients. The most prevalent genotype was FimA II, with no statistically significant differences found between the groups. The distribution for healthy patients was: FimA II (57%), FimA I (20.8%), FimA III (5.5%), FimA Ib (23.6%) and FimA IV (8.3%). For patients with diabetes the frequency was: FimA II (18.75%), FimA I (15.6%), FimA III (15.6%), FimA Ib (12.5%) and FimA III (6.25%). There was a high correlation among positive samples for P. gingivalis and for A. actinomycetemcomitans, T. denticola and T. forsythia. Conclusions: The prevalence of P. gingivalis is high in healthy patients and low in diabetic patients, which shows the importance of the inflammatory response in diabetic patients. The distribution of the genotypes of FimA was heterogeneous. There were no statistically significant differences found. A co-infection relationship was observed between P. gingivalis, T forsythis. and T. denticola. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]