comparison of culture and real-time pcr for detection of bordetella pertussis isolated from patients in iran.

background and objective: due to contagiousness of pertussis, a rapid and sensitive method for diagnosis is required to initiate the treatment and interrupt its transmission. materials and methods: to detect b. pertussis strains, we used two real-time pcr targeting is 481 and bp283 sequences and compared factors influencing culture and real-time pcr results. results: totally, 779 specimens were collected from patients among which 11 (1.4%) were culture positive. using is 481 and bp283 primers, 122 (15.6%) and 100 (12.8%) were diagnosed as infected specimens respectively. there were significant relationships between the real-time pcr method for diagnosis of b. pertussis and age, sex and vaccination of patients before sampling. conclusion:   the real-time pcr is superior and much more sensitive than culture for diagnosis of b. pertussis . however, the sensitivity was improved when both is 481 and bp283 were used. correct sampling and transportation of specimen also improved the detection rate in our research.