Correlation between tcdB gene PCR cycle threshold and severe Clostridium difficile disease

M A De Francesco; G Lorenzin; G Piccinelli; S Corbellini; C Bonfanti; A Caruso

doi:10.1016/j.anaerobe.2019.06.017

Correlation between tcdB gene PCR cycle threshold and severe Clostridium difficile disease

Anaerobe. 2019 Oct:59:141-144. doi: 10.1016/j.anaerobe.2019.06.017. Epub 2019 Jun 27.

Authors

M A De Francesco¹, G Lorenzin², G Piccinelli³, S Corbellini³, C Bonfanti³, A Caruso³

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Microbiology, Department of Molecular and Translational Medicine, University of Brescia-Spedali Civili, Brescia, Italy. Electronic address: maria.defrancesco@unibs.it.
² Institute of Microbiology, Department of Molecular and Translational Medicine, University of Brescia-Spedali Civili, Brescia, Italy; Institute of Microbiology and Virology, Department of Biomedical, Surgical and Dental Sciences, University of Milan, Italy.
³ Institute of Microbiology, Department of Molecular and Translational Medicine, University of Brescia-Spedali Civili, Brescia, Italy.

PMID: 31254653
DOI: 10.1016/j.anaerobe.2019.06.017

Abstract

A retrospective study, including all samples tested for Clostridium difficile from 2015 to 2018, was conducted. 222 and 199 patients were respectively classified as having a mild/moderate or severe disease. A C_T ≤ 26 was significantly associated with severe disease. Furthermore, low C_T values were significantly associated to older patients and leukocytosis.

Keywords: Cycle threshold; Leukocytosis; PCR.

MeSH terms

Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Bacterial Proteins / genetics*
Bacterial Toxins / genetics*
Clostridium Infections / pathology*
Humans
Male
Middle Aged
Polymerase Chain Reaction / methods*
Retrospective Studies

Substances

Bacterial Proteins
Bacterial Toxins
toxB protein, Clostridium difficile