Characterization of Salmonella Enteritidis isolated from foods and patients in northern Morocco.

OBJECTIVES This study aimed to investigate Salmonella Enteritidis strains isolated from human and food sources in the north of Morocco by means of phenotypic and genotypic methods. METHODOLOGY Fifteen isolates from humans and food were submitted to phage typing, XbaI-macrorestriction (pulsed field gel electrophoresis [PFGE]), enterobacterial repetitive intergenic consensus (ERIC-PCR), antimicrobial susceptibility testing, and PCR assay targeting the spvR and invA genes. RESULTS Six fingerprinting profiles were obtained with the ERIC-PCR method, four with PFGE profiling, five with antimicrobial resistance, three with phage typing, and only one with plasmid profiling. spvR gene was detected in six strains, which did not harbour plasmids of 90 kb. CONCLUSIONS The conclusions of this study are drawn from a limited number of isolates. It would be desirable to investigate a greater and more diverse population of Salmonella isolates. S. Enteritidis was genotyped and showed four different patterns by PFGE and six by ERIC-PCR. Accordingly, high genetic similarity and limited genetic diversity were found for these strains from north of Morocco.