The use of a commercial test system (SALMOTYPE ELISA) for tracing antibodies against Salmonella in the serum of pigs

The German Federal Ministry of Health and the Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Forestry have resented guidelines for a program to reduce the introduction of Salmonella into meat production via slaughter pigs . These guidelines intend to determine the prevalence of Salmonella in farms raising slaughter pigs. For this, random samples are to be examined with a meat juice ELISA for the detection of Salmonella antibodies. In this study the use of two such ELISA systems was tested. In order to compare the commercially available SALMOTYPE ®meat juice ELISA with a meat juice ELISA developed by the German Federal Institute for Health Protection of Consumers and Veterinary Medicine (BgVV) test sera were examined in parallel via both systems. In these examinations the SALMOTYPE ® meat juice ELISA showed a higher sensitivity. Further experiments were carried out to analyze the practical applicability of the SALMOTYPE ®meat juice ELISA. Fo r this, 119 serum samples of slaughter pigs were examined with the SALMOTYPE ®meat juice ELISA. The advantages of this test system, which were already noticed in the comparison of the two test systems, like quick performance, ease of application and reliability of results, were confmned in these examinations

The use of a commercial test system (SALMOTYPE ELISA) for tracing antibodies against Salmonella in the serum of pigs

The German Federal Ministry of Health and the Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Forestry have resented "guidelines for a program to reduce the introduction of Salmonella into meat production via slaughter pigs". These guidelines intend to determine the prevalence of Salmonella in farms raising slaughter pigs. For this, random samples are to be examined with a meat juice ELISA for the detection of Salmonella antibodies. In this study the use of two such ELISA systems was tested. In order to compare the commercially available SALMOTYPE ®meat juice ELISA with a meat juice ELISA developed by the German Federal Institute for Health Protection of Consumers and Veterinary Medicine (BgVV) test sera were examined in parallel via both systems. In these examinations the SALMOTYPE ® meat juice ELISA showed a higher sensitivity. Further experiments were carried out to analyze the practical applicability of the SALMOTYPE ®meat juice ELISA. Fo r this, 119 serum samples of slaughter pigs were examined with the SALMOTYPE ®meat juice ELISA. The advantages of this test system, which were already noticed in the comparison of the two test systems, like quick performance, ease of application and reliability of results, were confmned in these examinations.</p

Molecular Typing of Clostridium perfringens from a Food-Borne Disease Outbreak in a Nursing Home: Ribotyping versus Pulsed-Field Gel Electrophoresis

In 1998, 21 inhabitants of a German nursing home fell ill with acute gastroenteritis after consumption of minced beef heart (P. Graf and L. Bader, Epidemiol. Bull. 41:327-329, 2000). Two residents died during hospital treatment. Seventeen Clostridium perfringens strains were collected from two different dishes and from patients' stool samples and autopsy materials. A majority of these isolates was not typeable by restriction fragment length polymorphism-pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE). Subsequent ribotyping of C. perfringens distinguished four different groups. The same ribopattern was detected in a minced beef heart dish, in autopsy material from the two deceased patients, and additionally in stool samples from six further residents who had fallen ill with diarrhea. Three further ribopatterns from food and autopsy materials could be differentiated. As chromosomal macrorestriction with subsequent PFGE is generally regarded more useful than ribotyping for molecular strain analysis, four selected isolates were lysed in parallel with a standard protocol and two nucleases inhibiting modifications. Neither of these methods could differentiate all of the isolates. These results suggest that PFGE with the current standard protocols is not able to characterize all C. perfringens isolates from food-borne disease investigations and that ribotyping is still a helpful method for molecular identification of clonal relationships