CAMPYLOBACTER-JEJUNI ISOLATES FROM JAPANESE PATIENTS WITH GUILLAIN-BARRE-SYNDROME

Serologic evidence of recent Campylobacter jejuni infection was found in 92 (45%) of 205 Japanese patients with Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS ), and 49% of those 92 patients also had antibodies to GM(1). Sixteen independent clinical isolates from GBS patients were serotyped: 12 bel onged to Penner's heat-stable (HS) O serotype HS-19, 3 to HS-2, and 1 to HS-4. Of the patients whose C.jejuni isolates belonged to HS-19, 80 % had elevated anti-GM(1) antibodies. Although the correlation was sig nificant between C. jejuni and GM(1) antibody, anti-GM(1) also was det ected in 25% of patients without C.jejuni infection. Polymerase chain reaction-based restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis of an flaA gene showed that all HS-19 isolates, regardless of a GBS associa tion, had an identical and distinguishable pattern, Cj-1, suggesting t hat HS-19:Cj-1 isolates are distinctive among C. jejuni isolates. Lect in typing showed that all GBS-associated HS-19 isolates contained term inal beta-N-acetylglucosamine residues on their cell surface, but HS-1 9 isolates from patients with enteritis did not.