Value of a Novel Neisseria Meningitidis–Specific Polymerase Chain Reaction Assay in Skin Biopsy Specimens as a Diagnostic Tool in Chronic Meningococcemia

Value of a novel Neisseria meningitidis--specific polymerase chain reaction assay in skin biopsy specimens as a diagnostic tool in chronic meningococcemia.

BACKGROUND Chronic meningococcemia (CM) is a diagnostic challenge. Skin lesions are frequent but in most cases nonspecific. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based diagnosis has been validated in blood and cerebrospinal fluid for acute Neisseria meningitidis infection, in patients in whom routine microbiologic tests have failed to isolate the bacteria. In 2 patients with CM, we established the di...

Detection of Leishmania DNA in paraffin embedded specimens of chronic lupoid leishmaniasis using polymerase chain reaction

Background: Chronic lupoid leishmaniasis (CLL) is a chronicform of cutaneous leishmaniasis that is usually resistant to antileishmania agents and leishmania is not seen in the histologicsections. We used polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to detectleishmania DNA in CLL specimens.Method: This descriptive cross sectional study was done on20 paraffin embedded specimens of CLL cases referred to theder...

Diagnostic value of direct immunofluorescence of mucosal and skin biopsy specimens on formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded biopsy specimens compared to specimens placed in normal saline as the gold standard method in the diagnosis of a group of autoimmun

Background and Aim: Direct immunofluorescence (DIF) is represented as a gold standard method in diagnosis of autoimmune blistering dermatoses. Normal saline, liquid nitrogen and michel’ solution are a widely accepted media for preserving biopsy samples of skin or mucosa before DIF examination. Occasionally clinicians put the biopsy specimen taken for DIF in formalin 10%, occasionally clinicians...

A Diagnostic Multiplex Polymerase Chain Reaction Assay for Ocular Herpetic Infections.

Polymerase chain reaction as a diagnostic tool for detecting Leishmania.

Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) has been used to identify a Leishmania parasite in a cutaneous ulcer from a 27-year-old patient infected during travel in Peru. The available classical diagnostic methods could not confirm the diagnosis in a sufficiently short time. Therefore, two sets of oligonucleotides were designed and with both of them fragments of the expected size were obtained. The sequen...