Molecular methods applied to 2,855 strains of Campylobacter-like organisms received from a surveillance network of Campylobacter infections in France identified 29 Arcobacter butzleri infections. This species ranks fourth for Campylobacteraceae isolation and appears to have the same pathogenic potential as the other species in the genus.

We describe isolates from human Campylobacter infection in the French population and the isolates' antimicrobial drug resistance patterns since 1986 and compare the trends with those of isolates from broiler chickens and pigs from 1999 to 2004. Among 5,685 human Campylobacter isolates, 76.2% were C. jejuni, 17.2% C. coli, and 5.0% C. fetus. Resistance to nalidixic acid increased from 8.2% in 1990 to 26.3% in 2004 (p<10-3), and resistance to ampicillin was high over time. Nalidixic acid resistance was greater for C. coli (21.3%) than for C. jejuni (14.9%, p<10-3). C. jejuni resistance to ciprofloxacin in broilers decreased from 31.7% in 2002 to 9.0% in 2004 (p = 0.02). The patterns of resistance to quinolones and fluoroquinolones were similar between 1999 and 2004 in human and broiler isolates for C. jejuni. These results suggest a potential benefit of a regulation policy limiting use of antimicrobial drugs in food animals.

The identification of Campylobacter species and related organisms at the species level has always been difficult using phenotypic methods because of their low metabolic activity, whereas molecular methods are more reliable but time-consuming. In this study, 1007 different strains were identified using three different methods: conventional methods, molecular biology (real-time PCR and sequencing) and matrix assisted laser desorption ionization-time of flight (MALDI-TOF) mass spectrometry. Molecular methods were considered the gold standard. The accuracy of MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry reached 100% compared with the gold standard for all of the Campylobacter species, except Campylobacter jejuni (99.4%). The accuracy of conventional methods compared with the gold standard ranged from 0% to 100% depending on the species. However, MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry was not able to identify a mixture of two different species present in the same sample in four instances. Finally, MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry is highly recommended to identify Campylobacter spp. as only 0.4% discrepancy was found, whereas conventional methods led to 4.5% discrepancy.

A large database of Campylobacter isolates precisely identified at the species level was used to compare patients' characteristics. In a multivariate analysis, Campylobacter coli was found more often in older patients and in patients having traveled abroad and less often in summertime than Campylobacter jejuni. Campylobacter fetus infection occurred in much older patients and in hospitalized patients with a systemic disease.T hermotolerant Campylobacter spp. are recognized as the leading cause of bacterial enteric infections worldwide, while Campylobacter fetus often causes systemic infection.A subset of French clinical laboratories participates in the surveillance of Campylobacter infection, carried out by the National Reference Centre (NRC) for Campylobacters and Helicobacters under the leadership of the Institut de Veille Sanitaire (InVS), sending approximately a quarter of campylobacters isolated in France to the NRC.Our aim was to use this large database (Ͼ22,000 strains) to look for differences in the characteristics of the patients and the circumstances under which these Campylobacter species were isolated.(The results of this study were presented as posters at the European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, London, United Kingdom, 2012, and at the Réunion Interdisciplinaire de Chimiothérapie Anti-infectieuse, Paris, France, November 2012.)Network of laboratories. The laboratories sending strains were not randomly selected but were contacted from the list of laboratories already sending isolated Salmonella species to the corresponding NRC. A survey performed in 2009 showed that equal proportions of all strains isolated came from the different regions, with a few exceptions (InVS-NRC, unpublished data). The methods used by these laboratories to isolate Campylobacter species were fairly uniform, including the use of Karmali medium or Campylosel (bioMérieux, Marcy l'Etoile, France) but no filtration techniques.Identification of campylobacters at the NRC. All of the Campylobacter isolates were identified by phenotypic methods at the genus level. From 2003 to 2009, identification to species level was performed both by standard phenotypic methods and a real-time PCR targeting the gyrA gene (accuracy, 99.9%) to differentiate Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli (1). In the case of negative results, primers specific for C. fetus were used. If no result was obtained, a PCR specific for Arcobacter species was carried out (2). These PCRs allowed the identification of approximately 99% of the isolates. For the remaining 1%, the 16S rRNA gene was sequenced. In 2010, these methods were replaced by matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization-time-of-flight (MALDI-TOF) mass spectrometry identification, which has an accuracy of 99.4% for C. jejuni and 100% for the other Campylobacter species (3).Susceptibility testing was performed by disk diffusion with the same methods and cutoffs from the Comité de l'Antibiogramme de la Société Française de Microbiologie (CA-SFM) that have been used durin...

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Les infections à Campylobacter chez l'homme en France : bilan des trois années de surveillance 2001-2003 Campylobacter infections in human: results of three years of surveillance 2001-2003 Par Anne GALLAY (1) , Valérie PROUZET-MAULEON (2) , Henriette De VALK (1) et Véronique VAILLANT (1) , Leila LABADI (2) , Jean-Claude DESENCLOS (1) et Francis MEGRAUD (2) (communication présentée le 26 mai 2005) La fréquence des infections humaines à Campylobacter, leur gravité potentielle et l'existence de mesures de prévention justifient une surveillance. En France, un système de surveillance des infections à Campylobacter a été mis en place en avril 2002, à partir des laboratoires de ville (LABM), en complément de celui du réseau des laboratoires hospitaliers (LH) existant depuis 1986. Entre le 1/01/01 (pour les LH), le 1/04/02 (pour les LABM) et le 31/12/03, le Centre National de Référence des Campylobacter a expertisé 3 698 souches. Le taux global d'isolement de 3,4/100 000 était très largement sous-estimé : il était de 14/100 000 pour les enfants âgés de moins 5 ans. C. jejuni représentait 76,9 % des souches, suivi de C. coli (17,0 %) et de C. fetus (5,4 %). Le taux de résistance à l'ampicilline était de 41 % et à l'acide nalidixique de 28 %. Les efforts pour la surveillance doivent être poursuivis, afin de mieux connaître les caractéristiques épidémiologiques des infection à Campylobacter en France et de faire des estimations d'incidence en population générale.

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