Helicobacter pylori populations in Peruvian patients

Douglas E. Berg, Robert H. Gilman, Janaki Lelwala-Guruge, Kalpana Srivastava, Yanet Valdez, Jose Watanabe, Juan Miyagi, Natalia S. Akopyants, Alberto Ramirez-Ramos, Tacano H. Yoshiwara, Sixto Recavarren, Raul Leon-Barua

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

43 Scopus citations

Abstract

Helicobacter pylori is an extremely diverse species. The characterization of strains isolated from individual patients should give insights into colonization and disease mechanisms and bacterial evolution. We studied H. pylori isolates from patients in the Japanese-Peruvian Polyclinic in Lima, Peru, by determining metronidazole susceptibility or resistance and by random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) fingerprinting (a measure of overall genotype). Strains isolated from several biopsy specimens from each of 24 patients were studied. Both metronidazole-susceptible and -resistant strains were isolated from 13 patients, whereas strains of more than one RAPD type were isolated from only seven patients. We propose that the homogeneity in RAPD fingerprints for strains isolated from most persons reflects selection for particular H. pylori genotypes during chronic infection in individual hosts and the human diversity in traits that are important to this pathogen. Carriage of related metronidazole-resistant and -susceptible strains could reflect frequent metronidazole use in Peru and alternating selection for resistant and susceptible phenotypes during and after metronidazole therapy.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)996-1002
Number of pages7
JournalClinical Infectious Diseases
Volume25
Issue number5
DOIs
StatePublished - 1997

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