Epidemiological and laboratorial profile of patients with isolation of nontuberculous mycobacteria.

BACKGROUND: An increase in NTM diseases in the international scenario has been observed in recent years. AIMS: To analyze the epidemiological and laboratory profiles of patients with isolation of nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) over one decade. A retrospective analysis of records of a mycobacterial reference laboratory found 135 cases with isolation of NTM. METHODS: Clinical and epidemiological data were collected from the records of government health clinics and from the State notification system (TBWEB). The cases were geocoded by location based on the street address in the Mercator Transverse Universal projection, Datum SAD/69 and MapInfo software. RESULTS: Most patients were male (66.7%), older than 50 years (40%) and had only completed elementary schooling (38.5%). Associated health problems were found in 71.8% of the subjects, with 43.7% being HIV positive and 25.9% having had tuberculosis in the past. Hospitals were the most able institutions to diagnose cases (45.2%). Sputum was the most common material tested (63.0%) with the bacilloscopy being positive in 33.3% of cases. The most common mycobacteria species in the region were Mycobacterium avium and M. abscessus/M. massiliense/M. bolletii. When the regional reference municipality was analyzed, M. avium and M. fortuitum were the most common species isolated in the urban area. CONCLUSIONS: In the study region, mycobacteriosis most affected adult males with low schooling. Most patients presented comorbidities in particular co-infection with the HIV virus. M. avium is the most prevalent species in the region with the M. abscessus/M. massiliense/M. bolletii species being the main cause of nosocomial infections.

Nucleotide and phylogenetic analysis of human papillomavirus types 6 and 11 isolated from recurrent respiratory papillomatosis in Brazil.

There are few studies about the distribution of natural molecular variants of low-risk HPVs. Our aim was to evaluate the E6 early gene variability among HPV-6 and HPV-11 isolates detected in recurrent respiratory papillomatosis (RRP) samples obtained in a cohort of Brazilian patients. We also performed a phylogenetic analysis in order to compare nucleotide sequences identified in our study with previously reported isolates from different anatomic sites (laryngeal papillomas, genital warts, cervical cancer and anal swabs) obtained from other parts of the world to determine the phylogenetic relationships of variants detected in Brazil. The complete coding region of the E6 gene of 25 samples was cloned and sequenced: 18 isolates of HPV-6 (72%) and 7 isolates of HPV-11 (28%). A total of four different HPV-6 genomic variants and two HPV-11 genomic variants was identified. It was not possible to correlate specific variants with disease severity. Phylogenetic trees for both HPV types were constructed enclosing both E6 sequences detected in our study and formerly published sequences. In both phylogenetic trees, the sequences from Brazil did not group together. We could not establish a geographical association between HPV-6 or HPV-11 variants, unlike HPV-16 and HPV-18.