Asociacion entre los criterios de clasificacion genotipica de Staphylococcus aureus resistente a meticilina que se obtuvo mediante electroforesis en geles de campos pulsantes y mediante reaccion en cadena de la polimerasa de regiones hipervariables del gen mecA

Introduction: The emergence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has become a major epidemiological problem worldwide. Methods: We determined the degree of association between the genotype screening results obtained by pulse-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for 7 hypervariable DNA regions associated with the mecA gene (HVR-mecA PCR), in the epidemiological analysis of 36 MRSA strains unrelated to nosocomial outbreaks, isolated from hospitalized patients at the County Hospital of Valdivia (Chile). Results: The strains were classified into 15 pulse types (A-O) and 5 genotypes (6, 14, 15, 16, and 17) by PFGE and HVR-mecA PCR, respectively. Most of the strains were grouped in pulse types D, E and I, which presented 85.7% similarity. The most common genotypes were 14 (36.1%) and 15 (33.3%). Each genotype