Infection status and virulent genes of Aeromonas in diarrhea patients in Pudong New Area, Shanghai / 中华流行病学杂志

ABSTRACT

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To investigate the infection status and virulent genes of Aeromonas in patients with acute diarrhea in Pudong New Area, Shanghai.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>In 2012, stool samples were collected from diarrhea patients in 12 sentinel hospitals in Pudong for the detections of 13 pathogens causing diarrhea, and the detections of 5 diarrhea related virulent genes were conducted for Aeromonas isolates.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>A total of 101 patients were infected with Aeromonas in 2533 patients (4.0%). A total of 101 Aeromonas strains were isolated, including 17 Aeromonas hydrophila strains (18.8%), 44 Aeromonas veronii biovar sobria strains (52.5%) and 12 Aeromonas caviae strains (29.7%). And 44 coinfections with other pathogens were detected. Aeromonas infection mainly occurred in summer and in people aged ≥20 years. Among the patients infected with Aeromonas, 71 (70.3%) had watery diarrhea, 20 (19.8%) had vomiting and 11 (10.9%) had fever. Virulent genes detection showed that 95.0% of the Aeromonas. strains carried virulent genes, and the detection rates of hlyA, aerA, act, alt, and ast genes were 5.9%, 6.9%, 67.3%, 42.6% and 13.9%, respectively.</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>High incidence of Aeromonas infection was found in the patients with acute diarrhea in Pudong, and a high proportion of coinfections with other pathogens was detected too. Most Aeromonas strains carried virulent genes, and the distribution varied.</p>