In July 2014, an outbreak of Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) O55:H7 in England involved 31 patients, 13 (42%) of whom had hemolytic uremic syndrome. Isolates were sequenced, and the sequences were compared with publicly available sequences of E. coli O55:H7 and O157:H7. A core-genome phylogeny of the evolutionary history of the STEC O55:H7 outbreak strain revealed that the most pa...

BACKGROUND Varicella-zoster virus (VZV) is the etiologic agent of two diseases, varicella (chicken pox) and zoster (shingles). Varicella is a self- limited infection, while zoster is mainly a disease of adults. The present study was conducted to isolate VZV from clinically diagnosed children using cell cultures and compare the activity of liquorice powder extract, an alternative herbal antivira...

BacT/Alert FAN blood culture bottles have been shown to enhance the recovery of bacteria and yeast from blood compared with standard BacT/Alert bottles. It is well established that standard BacT/Alert blood culture bottles require no more than 5 days of incubation for the detection of routine bacteria and yeast. It is less clear, however, whether FAN bottles also routinely require 5 days of inc...

Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS) is a clinically heterogeneous groupof inherited disorders with ten different types, all involving agenetic defect in collagen and connective-tissue synthesis andstructure that affecting the skin, joints, and blood vessels. EDStype VIA, a very rare kyphoscoliotic type, is autosomal recessiveand clinically characterized by soft extensible skin, laxity ofjoints and kyp...

Milk samples of 100 clinically mastitic bovines (50 each from buffaloes and cows) were processed for bacterial isolation. A total of 90 bacterial isolates, including 33 of staphylococci and 57 of other bacterial species were recovered. Of the 33 staphylococcal isolates, 23 were identified as Staphylococcus aureus and 10 as Staphylococcus epidermidis. All Staphylococcus aureus isolates were posi...

Escherichia coli O26 and O157 have similar overall prevalences in cattle in Scotland, but in humans, Shiga toxin-producing E. coli O26 infections are fewer and clinically less severe than E. coli O157 infections. To investigate this discrepancy, we genotyped E. coli O26 isolates from cattle and humans in Scotland and continental Europe. The genetic background of some strains from Scotland was c...

Over a period of 15 months, 17 children were admitted to the Red Cross War Memorial Children's Hospital (RCWMCH) in Cape Town with Guillain-Barré syndrome. Stool specimens were collected from 14 children and campylobacter was isolated from nine. Six of the nine isolates of Campylobacter jejuni were further identified as C jejuni biotype 2, serotype 0:41. This biotype 2, serotype 0:41 has been i...

OBJECTIVES A multicentre surveillance of tigecycline activity against relevant pathogens in the UK. METHODS Forty-three representative UK hospitals were each asked to test 150 consecutive, clinically significant isolates from hospitalized patients, excluding those from urine or faeces. The sentinel laboratories tested all these isolates against a panel of antibiotics by the BSAC disc method a...

Staphylococcus epidermidis is a major cause of catheter-related bloodstream infections (CRBSIs). Recent studies suggested the existence of well-adapted, highly resistant, hospital-associated S. epidermidis clones. The molecular epidemiology of S. epidermidis in Belgian hospitals and the Belgian community has not been explored yet. We compared a set of 33 S. epidermidis isolates causing CRBSI in...

abstract background: escherichia coli, known as a clinically significant bacteria, can cause a wide range of infections, including urinary tract infections (utis), blood stream infections (bsis), and can frequently be isolated from various clinical specimens. evaluation of antimicrobial resistant pattern is a necessary action, especially about such bacteria which are frequent and life threateni...