Abstract

In an outbreak of diarrhoeal disease in an orthopaedic ward Clostridium difficile was isolated from all six patients with diarrhoea. Attempts were made to type these isolates by means of antibiogram, detection of pre-formed enzymes, analysis of surface proteins by sodium dodecyl sulphate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) and immunoblotting, and plasmid profile analysis. This showed that a single strain (type E) indistinguishable by the four distinct methods of typing, was isolated from all six patients at some time during their episodes of diarrhoea. Relapse was caused by the acquisition of a new strain in two patients, and by re-emergence or reacquisition of the original strain in two patients. The immunochemical method was the most sensitive and discriminatory of the typing strategies adopted.