Diagnosis of Chlamydia trachomatis infection

Abstract

Important progress in the diagnosis of Chlamydia trachomatis (C. trachomatis) includes the development of nucleic acid amplification techniques such as polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and ligase chain reaction (LCR). Commercial kits are available, but they are costly, sporadic in availability, must be imported, and are economically beyond the reach of common people. To overcome this limitation, most research laboratories have standardized their in‐house‐developed PCR methods for diagnosing this infection. However, each laboratory has to spend a great deal of time and money to accomplish this. Published reports do not always elaborate the steps involved in standardizing a test so that it can immediately be reproduced in another setting. In the present study we attempted to elaborate the steps involved in standardizing a sensitive and specific PCR technique followed by hybridization with specific C. trachomatis probe to diagnose this infection in cervical, introital, and urine specimens, and used it to determine the infection rate in a clinical population. J. Clin. Lab. Anal. 20:8–14, 2006. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.

Use of vaginal pH in diagnosis of infections and its association with reproductive manifestations

“…The gynecologist read the vaginal pH after removing the speculum from the vagina to avoid interpersonal variation. Swab collected from the endocervix was used for C. trachomatis detection by polymerase chain reaction following the indigenously standardized technique (20). Statistical analysis was done using Epi Info version 6 package with Yates correction of w 2 value.…”

Does CCR5 gene-D32 deletion protect C.trachomatis infected Indian women from tubal pathology?

“…PCR was performed on extracted DNA using a primer pair selected from the conserved region of the Major Outer Membrane Protein (MOMP) gene of C. trachomatis 15 following a standardized PCR program. 16 This primer pair amplifies an 180bp DNA fragment, which is common to all serotypes of C. trachomatis. The amplified 180bp PCR products were immediately frozen for further analysis or electrophoresis was carried out on 2% agarose gel containing Ethidium bromide and observed under a UV transilluminator and the results were documented.…”

Value of direct antigen detection methods in diagnosing women with suspected genital Chlamydia trachomatis infection

“…On the other hand, some authors reported that sensitivity of ELISA was 50 and 58%, respectively and the specificity was 100% by both studies (Malik et al, 2006;Mania-Pramanik et al, 2006). However, it was stated that in low prevalence populations the positive predictive value decreases rapidly with specificity which is a mathematical relationship (Dierksheide, 1987).…”

“…The sequences of these oligonucleotide primers from 5' to 3' are as follows: Sense: 5' GCC GCT TTG AGT TCT GCT TCC 3'. Antisense: 5' GTC GAA AAC AAA GTC ACC ATA GTA 3' (Mania-Pramanik et al, 2006). PCR was done in a total volume of 50 µL.…”