Incidence of enteroadherence in diarrhoegenic Escherichia coli in infants in Delhi.

ABSTRACT

Fifty-six isolates of Escherichia coli including 40 isolates from diarrhoeic infants and 16 from non-diarrhoeic infants were investigated. Twenty-two of the diarrhoeic isolates were typable, the most common serogroup being 086 (33%). None of the non-diarrheic isolates are typable with EPEC antisera with enteropathogenes. Adherence tests with HEp-2 cell line revealed localized adherence in 23%, diffuse adherence in 14% and aggregative adherence in 5.7% of the 35 isolates tested. Aggregative adherence was not observed in any of the EPEC isolates. None of the isolates in the control group exhibited localized or aggregative adherence. However, 25% of these isolates showed diffuse adherence (DA) which was not significantly different from the incidence of DA (34%) in the test group (p > 0.05). The importance of serogrouping and studying adherence pattern of E. coli isolates in establishing their pathogenic potential is thus emphasized.