ABSTRACT
Background: Chlamydia trachomatis [CT], the most common bacterial sexually transmitted infection [STI], leads to pelvic inflammatory disease, infertility and chronic pelvic pain in women as well as an increased risk of vertical transmission, conjunctivitis and pneumonitis in infants. It may also be a co-factor along with human papillomavirus [HPV] in cervical cancer progression. We aimed to determine the prevalence of CT genotypes in genital specimens of women from South Khorasan, Iran and to test the association between CT and cytology statistics
Materials and Methods: This was a cross-sectional study on 248 Pap smear samples from women who visited a gynecologist for routine Pap smear testing in South Khorasan province. Nested polymerase chain reaction [PCR] was used to test the residual fluids of Pap smears for CT-DNA after cytological examination. Direct sequencing, alignment and phylogenic analyses were performed on eight samples to identify their genotypes
Results: The mean age of patients was 37.54 +/- 5.21 years. Most samples had a normal cytology [214 cases, 86.29%]. Overall, 31 samples were positive for CT infection [12.5%] of which 20 [9.34%] were normal and 11 [32.35%] were abnormal, with the frequency difference being significant [P=0.022]. The co-infection of CT/HPV in total was identified in 14 cases [5.6%]. The results of sequencing eight samples out of the 31 CT positive samples revealed the detection of genotypes D and E, each with four cases
Conclusion: We show that a high prevalence of genital CT infection is present in women with both normal and abnormal cytology; however, the higher prevalence among women in the abnormal group may indicate its involvement in cervical neoplasia
ABSTRACT
The aim of this study was to compare the diagnostic value of fluorochrome microscopy [FM] with Ziehl-Neelsen [ZN] staining in the diagnosis of tuberculosis [TB]. In this study, 920 consecutive patients suspected of having pulmonary TB, referred to TB laboratory, provincial office of health care, Birjand University of Medical Sciences, recruited and a total of 2760 sputum specimens were collected from them. All samples were smeared and stained using both Ziehl Neelsen and auraminphenol methods as recommended by WHO. All positive smears by fluorescent microscopy were over-stained by ZN technique for confirmation. The sensitivity of ZN staining was also evaluated in different contamination conditions. A total of 102 out of 920 study subjects had pulmonary TB, of them 68 [66.66%] patients were smear positive by either staining method while others were smear negative. The proportion of positive smears detected was 51% and 57% for the ZN and auramine phenol staining methods, respectively. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value were 51%, 100%, 100%, 94% and 57%,100%,100, 95% for the ZN and auramine phenol staining methods, respectively. FM is more sensitive than ZN for diagnosis of TB. However, since FM is more sensitive and rapid, using this method in clinical laboratories with large specimen numbers is recommended