High individuality of respiratory bacterial communities in a large cohort of adult cystic fibrosis patients under continuous antibiotic treatment.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Routine clinical diagnostics of CF patients focus only on a restricted set of well-known pathogenic species. Recent molecular studies suggest that infections could be polymicrobial with many bacteria not detected by culture-based diagnostics.

Methodology and principal findings

A large cohort of 56 adults with continuous antibiotic treatment was studied and different microbial diagnostic methods were compared, including culture-independent and culture-based bacterial diagnostics. A total of 72 sputum samples including longitudinal observations was analysed by 16S rRNA gene sequence comparison. Prevalence of known pathogens was highly similar among all methods but the vast spectrum of bacteria associated with CF was only revealed by culture-independent techniques. T

SUBMITTER: Kramer R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4324987 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature