A Novel Nested Real-time Polymerase Chain Reaction for Treponema pallidum DNA in Syphilis Biospecimens

Background Early diagnosis of Treponema pallidum infection is helpful for disease management, and conventional PCR is suitable for lesion swabs of patients with probable early syphilis. We thus tested nested and real-time PCR (NR-PCR) in various biosamples from syphilitic patients. Methods Samples were collected from syphilis patients before treatment. Specific primer sequences targeting the T. pallidum gene polA were designed for NR-PCR. Results Across syphilis types, most samples assayed with NR-PCR returned a positive result, including earlobe blood (92.0%), cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) (90.2%), lesion swabs (74.3%), serum (66.9%), and whole blood (64.2%). No significant differences were observed in positive samples for whole blood, serum, and lesion swabs between primary and secondary syphilis (P> 0.05 for all comparisons). However, more whole-blood samples from patients with secondary syphilis were positive for NR-PCR than whole blood samples from patients with tertiary and latent syphilis (P
Source: Sexually Transmitted Diseases - Category: Sexual Medicine Tags: Original Studies Source Type: research