RESUMO
Forty children with asthma and 40 children without asthma or any other respiratory tract infection [controls] were included in this study. Their ages ranged from 2-15 years. All cases and controls were subjected to thorough clinical examination, chest x-ray, complete blood count, throat swab [for isolation of mycoplasma]. Complement fixation [C.F.] and cold agglutinin [haemagglutination] test [cHA] were done for serological diagnosis of mycoplasma infection. Polymerase chain reaction [PCR] was carried out for rapid detection of M. Pneumoniae in asthmatic children only. The isolation rate of M. Pneumoniae in asthmatic children was 22.5% while that in controls was 5%. It has been found that M. Pneumoniae was more common in the older asthmatic children [33.3%] than youngest children 12.5%] M. Pneumoniae was more common among the severe asthmatic children [33.3%] than mild [0%] and moderate cases [23.8%]. There was no difference in the rate of isolation of M. Pneumoniae from asthmatic children according to presence or absence of family history of asthma [21.4%, 23% respectively]. According to the serological diagnosis of M. Pneumoniae, we found that the number of cases detected by cHA [6 cases] was less than that detected by CF test [11 cases]. In our study, 7 of 9 culture-positive clinical samples and 2 of 31 culture-negative samples gave positive results in the PCR. The results suggest that. M. pneumoniae might be one of the stimuli that trigger acute asthma and PCR is of high specificity for rapid detection, but it is expensive