Facilitating lymphogranuloma venereum surveillance with the use of real time polymerase chain reaction.

Siedner, Mark J.; Pandori, Mark; Leon, Segundo R.; Espinosa, Benjamin J.; Hall, Eric R.; Caceres, Carlos; Coates, Thomas J; Klausner, Jeffrey D.; and the NIMH Collaborative HIV/STD Prevention Trial Group.

En: International Journal of STD and AIDS, 2007.

Considering the recent resurgence of LGV as a known cause of severe proctitis among the gay male population and its unique treatment requirements, there is a need for more widespread surveillance of LGV among those at high risk for sexually transmitted infections. We tested 86 previously collected urogenital specimens, known to be C. trachomatis-positive. The samples were originally collected from Peruvian sites of the National Institute of Mental Health Collaborative HIV/STD Prevention Trial. Study target population included those at high risk for sexually transmitted diseases residing in urban, coastal, low-income settings. All specimens were subject to nucleic acid extraction by an automated method. We used a recently described realtime polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay for the specific detection of L1–L3 serovars of C. trachomatis.