JAC Advance Access originally published online on June 16, 2006
Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy 2006 58(2):428-431; doi:10.1093/jac/dkl253
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Molecular typing of methicillin-resistant staphylococci isolated from cats and dogs
1 Sansom Institute, School of Pharmacy and Medical Sciences, University of South Australia GPO Box 2471, Adelaide, 5000 SA, Australia 2 Department of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, PathWest Laboratory Medicine WA Royal Perth Hospital, Perth GPO Box X2213, Perth, 6847 WA, Australia 3 Gram-Positive Bacteria Typing and Research Unit, Molecular Genetics Research Unit, School of Biomedical Sciences, Curtin University of Technology GPO Box U1987, Perth, 6845 WA, Australia
Received 4 April 2006; returned 25 April 2006; revised 27 May 2006; accepted 27 May 2006
*Corresponding author. Tel: +61-8-83022933; Fax: +61-8-83022389; E-mail: mary.barton{at}unisa.edu.au
Objectives: Methicillin-resistant staphylococci (MRS) isolates from healthy and diseased cats and dogs were characterized by staphylococcal cassette chromosome mec (SCCmec), multilocus sequence typing (MLST) and cassette chromosome recombinase gene (ccrAB) sequencing.
Methods: PCR-directed SCCmec typing was carried out for all MRS isolates and two Staphylococcus aureus and two Staphylococcus epidermidis strains were analysed by MLST. Strains belonging to SCCmec type III and IV were sequenced for their ccrAB gene of allotypes 3 and 2, respectively.
Results: Five types of SCCmec, types I, III, IV, IV (paediatric) and V SCCmec, were found. The S. aureus strains belonged to sequence type (ST) 239 and the two S. epidermidis belonged to ST43 and ST60 respectively. High sequence conservation was observed for the ccrAB gene of allotypes 2 and 3.
Conclusions: MRS isolates from cats and dogs demonstrate a similar diversity of SCCmec types to those found in human staphylococci and ST239-MRSA-III, a widely dispersed strain in human hospitals, was identified in diseased dogs.
Keywords: ccrAB gene , C-MRSA, MLST , SCCmec