Cultivation-independent analysis of changes in bacterial vaginosis flora following metronidazole treatment

Abstract

PCR was used to survey bacterial vaginosis flora before and after metronidazole treatment. The species composition for pretreatment patients was variable. Lactobacillus iners was prominent in all patients posttreatment. Atopobium vaginae concentrations were highest for patients who failed or responded incompletely to treatment and lowest for patients who were cured.

FIG. 1.

Number of clones of each 16S rRNA-defined phylotype detected in PCR-generated libraries using DNA isolated from vaginal swabs of BV patients before (dark gray) and after (light gray) treatment with metronidazole gel. While nearly all the 16S rRNA gene sequences detected in this study were ≥99% similar to those in public databases, in many cases the most similar 16S rRNA gene sequence is that of an uncultivated clone with a cryptic designation. Therefore, the species and strains listed to the left of each bar graph (with percentages of sequence similarity given in parentheses) represent recognized isolates or notable uncultivated BV-associated bacteria (e.g., BVAB1 [8]), and not necessarily the most similar database match to the phylotypes detected in this study.