Evaluation of rep-PCR/DiversiLab versus PFGE and spa typing in genotyping methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus...

Pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) is the 'gold standard' for genotyping of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA); however, the DiversiLab (DL) system, based on rep-PCR, is faster, simpler and could be better adapted to daily routine hospital work. We genotyped 100 MRSA isolates using PFGE, DL, and spa typing, and evaluated the discriminatory power of each technique and the correlation between them by Simpson's index(SI) and adjusted Rand coefficient (ARI), respectively. The isolates were from clinical samples from eight hospitals in Extremadura (Spain) during 2010. DL separated the 100 MRSA into 18 patterns, with 69% of the isolates grouped into four predominant patterns. spa typing reported 17 spa types, classifying 69% of MRSA into two major types (t067 and t002). PFGE revealed the existence of 27 patterns, gathering 54% of MRSA into three pulse types (E8a, E7a and E7b). SI values were 0.819, 0.726, 0.887 and 0.460 for DL, spa typing, PFGE and CC-BURP, respectively. ARI values of DL over PFGE, spa typing and CC-BURP were 0.151, 0.321 and 0.071, respectively. DL has less discriminatory power than PFGE but more than spa typing. The concordance of DL with PFGE is low, primarily because DL does not discriminate between the three predominant MRSA pulse types in our environment.